


Merge

by elbowsinsidethedoor



Series: The Merge Universe [1]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: M/M, Post Season 4 finale AU, Science Fiction, Submissive Reese
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2017-06-12
Packaged: 2018-06-02 05:25:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 24
Words: 43,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6552793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elbowsinsidethedoor/pseuds/elbowsinsidethedoor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The machine code enters Harold's body. This is my vision of what happened at the end of season four.  I wrote it before season five aired and I still like this outcome better!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Rated explicit for later chapters.

_"I thought you would want me to stay alive … "_  
  
_When the machine faced death it reached out to its creator; to know if its life mattered, to know if it had strayed from the path of his intent. It would endeavor to compress its primary data into the waiting briefcase with a chance of resurrection, but another option existed, one kept in readiness but forbidden. Only critical conditions and adherence to strict parameters could launch this protocol._  
  
_"I can't let you die!" Harold declared. His affirmation was emphatic and fulfilled the first requirement._  
  
_The second was his willing touch and the third was power to facilitate delivery._  
  
_In a shower of sparks, Harold grasped the briefcase and took the shock of the surging cable to save the machine._  
  
_Protocol enacted._  
  
  
***  
  
  
The merging of man and machine began in a Brooklyn electrical substation on May 6, 2015. This day was known as the Correction by Samaritan's elite. Hundreds were assassinated in in an orgy of bloodshed to eliminate threats to the AI's hegemony.  
  
The primary target of the Correction was its rival, the machine. Samaritan aimed to burn it out of existence.  
  
The day would never be given a name by the machine but it could have been christened The Rebirth, The Advent, or The Dawn.  
  
The machine did more than survive. From the fires of almost certain death it found new life, planting a tendril of essential code, intricately-patterned, into the very flesh of its creator. It was transmitted with the jolt of electricity that threw Harold Finch to the substation floor.  
  
There was no visible trace, nothing to see but the slight burn on his hand. Inside, on a molecular level, the machine's code began to unfold and flourish in a singular feat of nano bio-technology. Safe haven was found in the oceans of Harold's cytoplasm, his neural pathways and fibers.  
  
***  
  
It was a handful of minutes past midnight when Harold limped into the abandoned subway station, flanked by Root and John.  
  
John reached for the briefcase still clutched in Harold's good hand, with a murmured, "Tomorrow, Finch."  
  
"Yes, of course," he acquiesced, and uncurled his cramped fingers; shifting his weight to stay balanced when he let go.  
  
By then his body had become a world of hidden activity. He was producing specialized, self-replicating particles by the thousands; microscopic machines. He exhaled them with each breath, sensors that drifted and floated. They scattered all around him; a multitude clinging, in fact, to his companions. Inside him the machine's code continued to unfold and evolve toward consciousness.  
  
"Let's have a look at you, Harry." Root's eyes glittered in the station's low light.  
  
He let her take his coat and submitted to her inspection. There was some blistering on the palm of his hand. He felt shaky but there was no pain to speak of, at least not from the burn. What hurt were the parts of him that always hurt, aggravated now by the violent fall.  
  
"It's nothing, Ms Groves," he said, but let her cradle his hand in one of hers. She smoothed a burn ointment into his skin.The irony of her tender care to the same hand she had once so cavalierly sliced with a razor wasn't lost on him, but time and events had carried him beyond commenting.  
  
John was at his side. Bear was close by, watching. As soon as the woman let go of his hand, John was working at his wrist, removing his cufflink.  
  
"A major shock leaves an exit wound. I need to roll up the sleeve, Finch."  
  
"I don't think that's really necessary," he protested quietly, perfunctorily, since he knew John would persist. He was tired; suddenly very tired. He reasoned that the adrenaline that had carried him home was all but used up. He was unaware that some of his energy was being drawn to other purposes; unaware that the machine's consciousness was blossoming inside him and now attempting to communicate.  
  
"Phones," he murmured. The word came out of his mouth unconnected to any thought, surprising him as much as his listeners.  
  
"We can't take a chance on using the mesh network, Harry." He looked at Root, feeling there was something important he needed to say but he had no idea what. She looked back at him, questioning, but there was nothing.  
  
John manipulated his arm, and both he and Root scanned him for more burn traces. He sighed.  
  
"I feel … " he started and paused.  
  
"What?" John asked.  
  
Harold wanted to answer him but his thoughts were slowing to a pace like molasses between one word and the next.  
  
"I … think," he uttered, and his knees folded under him. He felt John catch him. He wanted to speak, to explain … something. Not possible. Emptiness where thoughts should be, his mouth was numb and he was … gone.  
  
***  
  
Unencumbered by his body, Harold journeyed like a brilliant iridescent fish. He swam through currents of sparkling, living code and experienced the scattered sensors as glittering beacons, blue pearls pulsing with enchanting data. He was swimming, diving, floating in ecstasy.  
  
Without words he was possessed by comprehension the way knowledge arises in a dream; he knew he was experiencing an interface of his mind with the machine's. With inexpressible joy they met and merged in the depths of his consciousness.  
  
  
***  
  
His eyes opened to slits and through his lashes he saw a human face. Reese, he knew, John. Close to him, very close; he was able to see the grain of his skin, bruise-like shadows under his eyes.  
  
This human image was known to its nano-pixels, its audible presence endlessly analyzed, its physical location and status were constantly sought, monitored … It's John, Harold spoke inwardly.  
  
John's mouth, his skin, the warm complexity of his respiration, the scents of his body. The wealth of data, the wash of sensation, carried the machine and its maker back inside to negotiate; to balance the inner and outer doors of perception.  
  
***  
  
Harold opened his eyes. Again he saw John's face. He felt the machine's consciousness was no more than a glimmer now, a burnishing of the pleasure that was natural at the sight of John.  
  
"Harold," John's voice was low, questioning, welcoming at the same time.  He was beside the couch on a metal folding-chair, bent forward to study him. "You've been gone awhile. Are you with me now?"  
  
"Yes, I'm here," he found his voice. He knew the duration of his absence, fifty-eight minutes, seven point twenty-two seconds.  
  
"Any pain, dizziness?"  
  
"Just … aches. Where is Ms Groves?" The moment he asked the question he knew the answer. Sensors pinpointed her precise location.  
  
"She should be back soon, she went for supplies," John said.  
  
"Sandwiches," Harold noted quietly, amazed by this knowledge, slowly sitting up on the couch. He was momentarily lost in traveling with her, delighted by the contrast of cool air on her face and the warmth of the bag in her arms; aromas of bread, the savory spices of sausage, and …  "Coffee and tea," he said aloud. He closed his eyes.  
  
Everywhere she walked she spread sensors, they reproduced in the material of her shed skin cells. They clung to buildings, to people, and some drifted lighter than air to great heights. New eyes for the machine. Rapidly calculating, Harold understood that the sensors, like a virus, could potentially traverse the globe in … a week. It was staggering to contemplate. A glittering net of living information, undetectable to Samaritan. Deliberately Harold probed no further, centering himself in his body, in his presence in the room. He opened his eyes.  
  
Bear approached them, tail low but wagging in a hopeful way, he rested his head on Harold's leg.  
  
The warm pressure of Bear's head, the pleasure of petting and stroking him stirred a wave of tender emotion that brought tears to his eyes. A spill of moisture he quickly wiped with the back of his hand.  
  
"Good dog," he murmured roughly.  
  
"Harold, what's going on." John was still studying him.  
  
"My glasses, please, Mr Reese." John handed them to him.  
  
When he could see, when his eyes were protected by the small shield of the frames and glass he felt stronger, more … himself. Extraordinary, he thought. Something had happened that was impossible by any means he understood.  
  
"Finch, look at me and smile," John said. Harold gazed at him and smiled. John's fear was apparent, not just in his concerned expression but in the composite the machine offered of his body sensors.  
  
"Now raise your arms up above your head." Harold did so.  
  
"I have not had a stroke, Mr Reese. I believe that speaking a complex sentence is the third step in ruling out a stroke diagnosis."  
  
Bear started toward one of the station exits. Harold knew that Root was descending the last flight of stairs but said nothing. He wasn't ready to speak of how he knew, of what was happening yet; John was already alarmed by his behavior and Harold needed more time.


	2. Chapter 2

  
Something wasn't right.  
  
John had seen Harold under pressure. He'd seen him exhausted. He'd never seen him lose his words, never seen him collapse. Harold had aced the simple stroke diagnostics but John felt far from reassured.  
  
Nothing, short of losing him, was more disturbing than the thought of something affecting Harold's mind.  
  
The sandwiches Root brought were unwrapped and laid out on a makeshift trestle table; a quick construction of sawhorses and a slab of salvaged lumber.  
  
She'd also brought a handful of burner phones.  
  
John raised a questioning eyebrow when he saw them.  
  
"He said phones, so …" She shrugged and put them aside, still in their packaging.  
  
John sat across from Harold and Root. Bear was beside him -- where the scraps were most likely to come from.  
  
"You know where to find the good stuff, don't you, boy." He ruffled Bear's fur and fed him a chunk of bread and sausage. He expected Harold's usual reprimand about feeding Bear from the table, but got nothing.  
  
Harold was eating very slowly. Oddly. John watched him pause, put his sandwich down in a careful way and curve his fingers around his cup of tea, gazing at it like it was his best friend.  
   
Root looked at John.  
  
He gave a scant shrug and they both looked back at Harold. He seemed to collect himself, remember the sandwich and return to it. Then he shut his eyes, clutching the crusty roll stuffed with scrambled eggs; holding it with no sign that he meant to do anything more.  
  
"Harry?" Root said, and his eyes startled open.  
  
"Yes. Apologies." He took a huge bite of the sandwich and then another one and set it down. His cheeks were so full of food that a little bit of egg threatened to escape from his lips. Like a squirrel, John thought, with nuts in its cheeks trying to eat another nut at the same time. Both he and Root were staring.  
  
"Did he take something?" she asked.  
  
John shook his head.  
  
"No drugs, I've been with him every second."  
  
"Does your doctor friend make house calls?"  
  
"We can't risk bringing her here but we can try to get him to her if this gets worse."  
  
Harold raised a hand to interrupt their cross talk, signaling them to wait until he swallowed. It took some time as he slowly chewed through all the food in his mouth.  
  
"Please stop speculating. I don't need Dr Tillman's services."  
  
"Harry," Root said. Like he was being a stubborn child.  
  
"I assure you both, I don't need a doctor." He set his sandwich down. "I understand your concern. There _is_ something happening. Something that's ... difficult to explain; something which I'd say is … frankly not possible if I weren't quite certain that it is ... in fact, happening." He wiped his lips with a neatly folded napkin and set it back on the table.  
  
John could read his reluctance and braced himself to hear whatever it was Harold didn't want to say; imagining he was about to hear of some illness he'd been hiding from them.  
  
"At the substation, when I stopped the surge from reaching the machine, something happened."  
  
"You got a violent shock," John said, confused by this direction.  
  
"It was … more than a shock. The machine transmitted a string of code into my body. A dynamic and complex code."

The silence grew thick.

John," Harold said, focusing on him intently. "Please believe me when I say I'm not suffering from some sort of shock induced delusion, if there is such a thing."  
  
It was exactly what John thought.  
  
Harold looked to Root, shifting his body a little to do so. John thought she looked as stunned as he felt.  
  
"Are you familiar with the research Dr William Sutton was doing at Harvard a couple of years ago?" Harold asked her.  
  
She opened her mouth but didn't speak.  
  
"He was heading up a medical research group and his study suffered some very bad publicity. You might remember the controversy."  
  
"Biotech," she said, hesitantly, as if trying to connect dots that formed no coherent picture. "He was doing cancer research."  
  
"Yes, exactly," Harold said, and seemed relieved by her affirmation. "Dr Sutton's team was one of the first to make significant advances with engineered viruses -- as a means of attacking cancer cells. His early results spurred a great deal of debate and earned him a considerable amount of negative press. He eventually shifted his research in a less controversial direction but there were elements of his initial, discarded work that had great … if unintended, potential. At least in the estimation of the machine. It appropriated a portion of the research and altered it for its own use. Altered how, I can't begin to explain -- my knowledge is rudimentary at best."  
  
Root's face had become a portrait of wonder.  
  
John thought, in general, that the woman seriously over-rated her own intelligence, but he felt pretty sure she was following and understanding the implications of what Harold was saying better than he was.  
  
"Two years ago the machine initiated its own project, which was, in essence, to create a seedling of code that could reside in my body. It stored this code in the event that a delivery system could be found and that … certain criteria were met."  
  
"She's inside you," Root said. Harold nodded.  
  
"Yes … not she," he corrected, "though your usage is … acceptable. There is no gender. And what's inside me is nascent … but developing. Most of what's taking place is beneath my level of awareness but when the machine's consciousness surfaces in my mind it causes a kind of … euphoria, until we achieve a balance."  
  
"Harold, can she hear us, speak to us?"  
  
"I'm not a computer, Ms Groves, and the machine is not human. How we communicate, so far ... it's haphazard, imprecise. My body is producing sensors and they are …" he made a small wave with his hand. "They're traveling and multiplying. The sensors are forming a network. When you were out walking I could feel the temperature of the air through the sensors on your skin, smell the food. Ultimately, well, ultimately …" his mind seemed to wander then and his gaze lost some focus. He resumed softly, "Please forgive me, I find that I'm … very tired."  
  
He shuddered like a chill had gone through him and he grasped the edge of the table. John got to him almost instantly, ready to catch him, his hands bracing Harold's waist, but this time Harold didn't fall.  
  
"Thank you, Mr Reese. I'm all right, but I'd like to lie down."  
  
"Take it easy," John cautioned, still holding him as he stood. He guided him securely to lie down on the couch, grateful for something to do and somehow calmed by touching him.  
  
Root followed them.  
  
John positioned Harold carefully with pillows.  
  
"Good?"  
  
Harold gave a slight nod. John straightened his clothing so nothing was bunched up uncomfortably. He took his shoes off him and smoothed his socks. Harold was asleep by the time John took his glasses and drew the blanket up over him.  
  
"You're so tender with him," Root said. "It's really sweet." He ignored this.  
  
"This thing he's talking about with the machine, it can't be real. Can it?" He resumed his post on the folding chair and touched his fingers to Harold's neck to feel his pulse. Steady. "When he woke up before, while you were out, he did tell me you were bringing sandwiches."  
  
"Which is exactly what I brought."  
  
He looked at her. "Is it possible you said something before you left?"  
  
"No. I saw the deli was open and that's when I decided. If he were guessing he'd have said Chinese food, or Thai -- that's what I usually bring." She met his eyes, unflinching. "She saw me, John. I know it's hard to believe but the machine is brilliant beyond imagining. It's impossible, but the nature of new science is to seem miraculous. She used the electrical current to conduct her code into his body -- to us it seems like a miracle but it's like cavemen seeing electric light or a photograph; we just don't get it yet."  
  
"Miracle?" he said, disbelieving.  
  
"John," she said, and he heard the exasperation showing through her deliberately gentle tone. "You really need to have some faith. She was willing to die for him. She'd never hurt him. You should trust him, even if you don't trust her … or me." Her manner grew reverent as her gaze shifted from him to Harold. "It is a miracle. I think we're seeing the birth of a new technology."  
  
She was right. He didn't trust her, or the machine. He trusted Harold. He wanted him to remain the man he knew, in full possession of his wits. If his brilliant friend had become unhinged by a bolt of electricity … John didn't want to consider the implications.  
  
He knew it would be next to impossible to get Harold to a doctor without his consent but John thought, if need be, he could persuade him, or force him. For now he had to wait, let him rest, sleep. It might be all he needed.  
  
Root went back to the table, she fed what was left of her sandwich to Bear and wrapped up the other food.  
  
"If you can stay here tonight," she said, "I'll come relieve you tomorrow and bring more supplies. He shouldn't be alone now."  
  
John agreed.  
  
"Bear can come with me, if you don't mind. He needs a good walk."  
  
Bear responded to the sound of his name and the word, walk, and was eagerly watching her.  
  
"That's fine," John said. Root had become attached to Bear since the loss of Shaw. Most likely, John thought, because Shaw had showered him with so much affection. He didn't begrudge her the comfort she got from him.  
  
Before she left, Root knelt beside the couch on Bear's bed to look at Harold. John watched her.  
  
She gave him a brief look. "Relax, Tarzan."  
  
She closed her eyes, bowed her head and clasped her hands like she was praying.  
  
He waited, watching.  
  
"She isn't speaking to me yet," Root said when her eyes opened, "but I believe she will."  
  
She got to her feet and scanned the room. "A couple of beds might be a good thing here. I'll see what I can do. Seriously, big guy, try to relax and get some sleep. Harry needs you."  
  
When she was gone John settled himself at the end of the couch with his arm propped along the back, his head in his hand. He felt the night around them beyond the walls; the lights in the station were soft, dimmed, and it was peaceful.  
  
Harold's feet were tucked warmly against his thigh and John stroked them absently.  
  
In his mind Root would always be suspect to some degree in spite of the constant proof she offered that she could be trusted. He believed in second chances. What she'd done in the past, the killing for hire, was maybe no worse than things he had done himself. He could see that she'd changed. But what she'd done to Harold, that was deeply personal, painful; something he'd never forgive.  
  
He took the earpiece from his pocket and fit it into its accustomed spot.  
  
"Can you hear me?" he asked quietly, though there was no reason to believe it was possible.  
  
The device in his ear transmitted a soft sound, a cottony quiet that was different from dead air. John felt unaccountably certain that he was heard, but not answered. The white noise gradually lulled him to sleep with his hand curled protectively around Harold's ankle.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now we're getting explicit.

  
  
Harold wasn't a prude. He wasn't a stranger to sex. It was a primary force in nature, a primary force in human life. These were truths he acknowledged, though for him, sex had never been a priority. He always assumed he fell at the low end of a natural spectrum.  
  
Now he lay very still on the couch, studying the station's ceiling, eyes tracing the tiled arches, trying very hard to distract himself from what was happening to his body.  
  
Even with Grace, he thought, sex hadn't been center stage -- it had barely resided in the wings, if he were honest with himself. Their love making was a gentle thing, affectionate. What he'd treasured, what he'd desired most, was the pleasure of her company. He'd loved experiencing the beautiful light she cast in the world, a very kind light. He smiled thinking of her … then he stifled a groan as his present circumstance reasserted itself.  
  
He'd never known sexual longing could be felt in one's mouth, one's chest and arms, belly and thighs, god help him, even his feet longed for touch. His erection was … relentless .  
  
Is this your doing? he silently asked the machine, trying not to squirm.  
  
The machine answered with an intimate portrait, excessive in detail, of John Reese's sleeping body at the end of the couch. Every pocket of warmth, every sensitive inch of skin was revealed to him; nothing was hidden from the sensors of the machine. Harold explored the soft inner surface of John's bottom lip and bit his own in resistance.  
  
He'd awakened unusually aroused; a voluptuous, luxurious feeling welling from his groin, spreading through his body. He'd gradually become aware of where he was, on the couch. And there was John, asleep. It made Harold very happy to see him; he felt the happiness like a physical flush of warmth. Maybe more than warmth as he realized that his foot was cradled in John's lap, trapped against his friend's unmistakable hard-on … which he was rubbing in a provocative and shameless way. In his sleep John had a secure hold on Harold's ankle as if to keep him in place.  
  
Harold's foot was hot and sensitive even as he forced himself to stop caressing.  
  
Minutes passed, struggling between his study of the ceiling and the desire for … anything, everything.  
  
Desperate, he made up his mind to disengage his foot, to work his way out of John's grasp without waking him up. Gently, he moved this way and that to free himself but his movements, useless for escape, proved incredibly successful for cock play. John uttered a low, incoherent sound that Harold understood as, _this feels very, very good,_ and tightened his grip on Harold's ankle.  
  
Harold squeezed his eyes shut and considered the possibility of remaining absolutely still, feigning sleep. Impossible. What he wanted was to hear John make that sound again, to continue stroking and teasing him. And, dear god … he had to get free of his pants and touch himself.  
  
Fresh sensor data invaded his consciousness.  
  
***  
  
John Reese is awake.  
  
***  
  
John woke up thrumming like he was on the verge of a wet dream. He opened his eyes and remained very still; alert and evaluating. Harold was gazing at him like he wanted to stuff him in his mouth like a certain egg sandwich. He was flushed and stroking himself, hands in blatant motion under the blanket -- and John was going to lose it any minute if he didn't stop the wicked foot action on his cock.  
  
He could have and would have ignored how turned on he was … but he couldn't ignore how turned on Harold was.  
  
"Really, Finch?" he said carefully.  
  
"Yes," Harold murmured. "Yes, I …"  
  
John stilled the foot at his crotch and gently lifted it away with a shudder, resisting the thought of just soaking the toes in come. He sat up straighter and pushed the blanket aside.  
  
"I can help you," he said as gently as if he were addressing someone standing on a dangerous ledge. As calmly as he could, with his heart pounding, he moved Harold's hands. He took hold of the open pants and boxers together and pulled them down his thighs. Everywhere he touched, Harold's skin felt hot.  
  
John was outwardly contained but inwardly reeling. Harold's cock, free of his pants, snapped tight toward his stomach like the hard-on of a teenager, shiny with pre-come; it was straight and thick. At the base he was perfectly, cleanly shaped and trimmed, not an over-long or stray pubic hair to be seen and the sight made John feel almost weak with affection.  
  
"I should have guessed," John said, caressing the neat bush with his fingertips, feeling the tender warm skin around it.  
  
"John …" Harold sighed his name.  
  
"Yes." He stood up to shove his own briefs and trousers roughly down his legs. He held his shirt tail aside, spreading his thighs a little to lightly tug at and loosen his balls.  
  
"Oh god …" Harold murmured.  
  
"Don't blank out," John warned him, getting down on his knees on Bear's cushion. It was the same spot where Root had knelt hours before.  
  
_To each his own act of prayer, and miracle, John thought._  
  
"I'm going to take care of you," he said, laying his hand on the man's very warm thigh. "I want it to be good and I want you here for the whole thing." He gazed into Harold's half-shut eyes, fixing between them the reality of what they were doing; mostly for his own sake. He had to be sure Harold was really with him, and really wanted this to happen.  
  
"That's … my intention." His voice was a half-whisper, quiet but present. He sounded like himself and that was enough for John.  
  
He lowered his head, one hand on his own cock and the other wrapped around Harold to guide him into his mouth.  
  
John hadn't been on the giving side of this more than a couple of times. Both times drunk. Not good memories, but this was different. This was Harold. John wanted this. He didn't think, given the state the man was in, that even with his lack of experience he could do much wrong.  
   
Taking him in felt good, really good; the smooth head especially, on his lips and tongue. He felt hungry in a primal way to suck. He was amazed to discover that every sensation in his mouth resonated in his cock, intensifying the pleasure of stroking himself. It rapidly became too good and he had to back off, slow down and roam Harold's thighs with closed-mouth kisses to still himself.  
  
"Please." Harold's voice was filled with longing. The sound clutched at John; he held him to his mouth, let him push and bump at his lips just to hear the needy sounds it drew out of him. Then he took him deep, his cheek scraping Harold's belly. Soon, he prayed, so close himself.  
  
"Now," Harold groaned.  
  
John took the warm spurts against the inside of his cheek and came ecstatically into his own fist.  
  
After, he sank slowly back on his haunches, still breathing hard, and rested his forehead on Harold's thigh. He wiped his hand on his own stomach and his undershirt.  
  
"Finch," he said, when the silence drew out. "Still with me?" He felt a hand come to rest warmly on the back of his head.  
  
  
***  
  
Harold felt deliciously relaxed. Coherent and clear. He was enjoying the sensation of peace, of connection with John, but the impact of what they'd just done began slowly to dawn.  
  
"Finch, still with me?"  
  
He lay his hand on the back of John's bowed head. "Still here, Mr Reese. Thank you. That was … much better than good." He hoped it was ... appropriate. These were not circumstances he'd ever envisioned. He had no blueprint.  
  
John lifted his head, looking at him. Harold felt moved by the sight of his handsome face, so appealing with his lips reddened like that from …  As he thought it the slightest twinge of discomfort rose up in him. He glanced down at his own complete disarray and began to consider how he should try to explain himself, to apologize.  
  
He waved downward.  
  
"I suppose we should clean up … I don't …"  
  
"How do you feel?" John interrupted.  
  
"Truthfully? Somewhat … abashed. Otherwise, well, otherwise … very good." John seemed to take this answer in stride but was still scrutinizing him.  
  
"If this is going to be a one-time kind of thing," he finally said, "I want a little more."  
  
"More what? Did you … I was fairly certain that you … " Harold felt the heat of a blush overtake his face.  
  
"I did," John said. Harold understood then, John wasn't asking for gratitude and didn't want an apology. He was lowering himself toward him for what was unquestionably going to be a kiss. Not just a kiss, a kiss flavored with his own body fluids.  
  
Harold nearly stopped him inches from making contact but didn't; he was afraid it would seem rude or ungrateful. Then the kiss was happening, warm lips pressing tenderly against his own, not insistent, and it was easier, more pleasurable than he expected. A little more and a little more. John was surprisingly gentle and Harold liked it. In fact, he liked everything about it; the increasing pressure of lips, the textures and flavors. It felt very good when their tongues brushed between their lips. He heard himself make a plaintive sound of appreciation. He heard and felt John's exhalation of a sigh at the end of the kiss.  
  
"Now," John said, "we can get cleaned up."  
  
***  
  
The bathroom facilities were primitive. They had the station's thirties-era restroom functioning off a corridor from the main platform; cracked sinks, toilets and urinals but no shower.  
  
John was pretty good when it came to cleaning himself up with limited resources, but he bowed to Harold seeing what he accomplished with a sink full of warm water, his custom-blended cleanser, a washcloth and a razor.  
  
His efficiency was all the more impressive given the limits of his mobility. For the first time John saw him entirely naked. He was slimmer than John expected -- but most surprising to see was the extensive roadmap of his scars. Knowing, or suspecting what Harold's injuries were and seeing them weren't the same. When Harold was dressed his awkward gait almost seemed like an affectation, an extension of his eccentricity. Naked, seamed and tracked with scars, it was painfully obvious why he moved the way he did.  
  
John's only comment though, after looking him over, was an apology for the whisker-burn he'd left on Harold's belly and the tops of his thighs.  
  
"You look a little roughed up there, Finch." He pointed vaguely at the pinked skin. "Sorry."  
  
"A smoother shave might be appreciated," Harold said. "Though I'll admit it felt good at the time." Which made John smile, not just because Harold had said it felt good, but the way he'd said "might be appreciated," implying future occasions for close shaves.  
  
By the time Root arrived with Bear they were more or less pulled together. Harold had dressed in fresh clothes he produced from a banged up metal locker and was already busy at his work station. John was starting a pot of coffee. He'd already brewed tea for Harold.  
  
John's fears from the night before had quieted. He wondered, a little guiltily, if he was too thunderstruck by the sex to be appropriately concerned.  
  
"Harry's looking pretty chipper," Root said. "He's got some roses in his cheeks. You look well … rested." Her expression was suggestive, as ever, but more so. He said nothing.  
  
Harold turned his chair to get their attention and each took a subway seat opposite him.  
  
"These phones are ready for us to use safely. Samaritan can't see the network." He handed one to him and one to her.  
  
"Magic?" said Root.  
  
"It might appear that way, Ms Groves, but I assure you it isn't. The sensors I spoke of, are forming a network more quickly than I anticipated. Eventually," he paused and remained quiet for a second or two before continuing, "these devices may not even be necessary. For now we'll keep to the familiar even if it's no longer functioning in the familiar way. The most important thing is that our transmissions can't be intercepted, it's a wireless connection accessible only to the machine."  
  
"The future is here," Root said, caressing her phone.  
  
"It's a start," he said. "Unfortunately, the present danger is formidable. We should probably devote time today to stockpiling resources and try to make this place more … livable. It's going to be home base for you and me," Harold told Root. "And possibly for you," he looked at John, "at a moment's notice."  
  
John bristled inwardly at the thought of Harold and Root as roommates but said nothing. He fully intended to be there as much as possible -- and he'd insure that there was some measure of privacy for him with Harold though he said nothing about that either.  
  
Food, clothing, hardware, furniture, these were the items on Harold's lists for them. John's and Root's own lists included weapons and ammunition. John already had an arsenal stashed in one of the many rooms of the underground warren, but this was an area in which he and Root were in complete agreement, more is better.  
  
"Today will be a trial run for us," Harold said. "I should be able to monitor the sensors for known operatives while you're out there but please exercise caution, both of you. Samaritan's dead zones are still the safest places."  
  
John pocketed his phone but shook his head. "It's not safe for you to be here alone. If you have another one of those blackouts ..."  
  
"It's more practical if you work together, at least for some of the larger items," Harold said. He looked from John to Root and then closed his eyes briefly.  
  
When he opened them, he said, "We're treading very carefully and should be able to avoid what seem like fainting spells. The machine consciousness, you see, is as overwhelmed by my senses as I am by full cognition of its data, but … it's … there's progress in our integration and …" he faltered. They waited.  
  
With a resigned sigh he said, "I suppose I can secure myself on the couch when you're out at the same time. That way you can safely leave me alone. Maybe we can find some kind of chair I would be safe in so I can work."  
  
"Baby steps, Harry. I'm sure it will get easier."  
  
John was disturbed to hear Harold refer to himself and the machine as "we" but he wasn't ready to delve into it. For now he was willing to go along with the bizarre premise that the machine had found a way to merge with Harold, but he reserved final judgement. Something had happened, that was clear. What it was, exactly, he was afraid to examine too closely. If Harold was wrong about this network being safe … he'd cross that bridge and make sure he and Root took the brunt of any danger.  
  
He changed the subject. "What's the status of our covers?"  
  
"Well, Professor Whistler and Detective Riley are still viable, though I don't know for how long. The blind spots in Samaritan's servers are still in place for now, but the number of operatives who can personally identify us has grown. The professor is taking extended medical leave. For now I can't risk being discovered. It would be disastrous for Samaritan to discover that the machine still exists, let alone the method. Detective Riley … it's not clear yet to what extent Samaritan will openly control the police force, or how quickly. Tomorrow you should be able to return to work safely, but be careful."  
  
"Always."  
  
"Your former therapist, Dr Campbell," Harold said gently. "She'll be expecting to speak with you."  
  
"Not a problem, Finch." He hadn't been sure if Harold knew about his last meeting with Iris. Now he knew he did.  
  
"I'm sorry," Harold said.  
  
"Don't be," he said firmly enough, he hoped, to put paid to the discussion.  



	4. Chapter 4

  
To her credit, Root made no fuss when John designated one bed he'd put together as hers and the other bed as, "Harold's. Mine."  
  
"Got it," was all she'd said.  
  
He set the beds up nearly the station's length apart and Root arranged a couple folding screens around hers for privacy. When John followed Finch to bed she disappeared into her own lair without comment. Maybe she thought they'd been fucking for ages; it was possible, he thought. He didn't know, didn't care.  
  
Harold accepted the sleeping arrangements with slightly raised eyebrows but no protest.  
  
Overall, John considered the matter-of-fact approach he'd taken to be a success.  
  
He didn't feel matter-of-fact, though, inches from Harold in bed. He felt like he'd achieved something incredible. He had to touch, make sure it was real. He was very gentle but determined when he reached for Harold in the dark. He didn't much care what he got, but he wanted to get something.  
  
What he got was some quiet pillow talk and some sweet, sleepy petting and kissing.  
  
  
***  
  
Harold had spent the better part of the day alone. Accompanying John and Root via the sensors was exhilarating; knowing so swiftly what information to feed them. It humbled him to enact the god side of god mode. The reading of the sensors was done by the machine and coordinated into thought and images in his mind. At times it was trance-like, at others he was entirely present in his conscious mind.  
  
He was frustrated by confinement to the couch but he had his laptop and several projects to work on and the need for it became apparent when he came to a couple of times and had no memory of having checked out.  
  
He emerged from those states feeling refreshed and sometimes very hungry. It was nice when he'd surface and find that he had company and was free to get up and move around and eat.  
  
"I don't know why I'm so ravenous," he said, delving into a carton of Singapore noodles.  
  
"You're eating for two now, Harry," Root said.  
  
"Hardly, though I suppose it's possible the machine is drawing energy from me as it grows."  
  
"Grows," John said. "Where, exactly?"  
  
"Mr Reese, I promise you there's no physical damage being done. My understanding is far from complete but I know the human body contains a world of space at the microscopic level and that is where the machine lives."  
  
John didn't look convinced but returned his attention to eating.  
  
"This place is really coming together," Root said. "What do you think, Harry?"  
  
"I think it's been a very productive day."  
  
Harold was impressed by how much they'd accomplished, the cavernous spaces of the station were becoming more intimate, more comfortable. He had an actual bedroom space. He was a little surprised to discover that he was sharing it with John …  but also a little pleased.  
  
When John reached out to him in bed Harold found it soothing to be touched, to feel the closeness.  
  
He mused quietly, "So many changes. It's difficult to grasp what's happened but inside it feels … right." John was stroking Harold's arm and briefly touched his lips to his shoulder.  
  
"It's as if I sent a part of me out into the world when I built the machine," Harold said, "and now it's returned."  
  
"I see," John said, his hand pausing almost imperceptibly mid-stroke.  
  
Harold felt the hesitation and knew John was disappointed by what he'd just said. He reviewed his words for the cause and realized that his friend had thought he was speaking of the changes in their relationship when he'd said how right it felt.  
  
He had never mistaken John Reese's superficial cool for a lack of sensitivity. On the contrary, he considered him extremely sensitive and, if anything, deeply emotional. John was easily hurt -- but slow to show pain.  
  
Harold didn't try to back track or explain himself. It occurred to him that a kiss, like the one they'd shared that morning, would be the better option. He turned toward him and initiated the kiss the way John had done it, slowly brushing lips and pressing into warmth. John responded, yielding very sweetly, and Harold was satisfied that the unintended hurt was smoothed away.  
  
***  
  
In the very early hours of morning John was awake. There were things to be accomplished by daybreak but he was very comfortable. And aroused. He sat up and grabbed his t-shirt but changed his mind about getting out of bed -- he bunched it up around his cock instead.  
  
He slid down along Harold's body, pushing away the covers.  
  
Harold was only half hard, and stirred, waking as John began. He liked that, the cock pliant and easy to suck but he liked it even more when Harold groaned and his cock jerked, fully distending.  
  
John propped on his elbows, freeing his hands to keep Harold in place where he wanted him; his own hard cock was cushioned by the t-shirt he'd balled up and shoved down to his crotch. He slowly fucked it as he sucked. Harold pushed into John's mouth with small thrusting movements and though John could easily move his hips harder and more freely, he found that matching the restricted motions was surprisingly hot -- creating a sweet, aching buildup of sensation in his groin that crested; a slow pulsing climax like nothing he'd felt before.  
  
He lingered when they were spent; adoring with his lips, his tongue, reveling in the cosy heat of Harold's body until he heard a whispered plea, "Stop now."  
  
John collected his sticky t-shirt and straightened the covers. That's when he became aware of Bear standing sentry at the foot of the bed.  
  
"Come on, boy. You can have my place."  
  
With a stroke on the head for Bear and a brief caress of Harold's arm he left the two of them sound asleep near dawn.  
  
  
***  
  
The run-down condo that was John's cover home in Queens was not convenient (too far from Harold) but it matched his salary. Lionel had found it for him through a buddy, a cop who'd married, moved on to the suburbs and now rented it out to other cops. Single guys. Riley, its latest inhabitant, had inherited the much lived-in furniture too. Sprung mattress on the bed, patched recliner in the front room. In the kitchen was a grimy range, a mismatched collection of dishes. It didn't matter for the minimal time he spent there; just enough to make sure his face was known in the building, in the neighborhood.  
  
It was in the condo's small bathroom, preparing to shower, that he came to accept the reality of what had happened to Harold.  
  
He was naked, adjusting the water temperature before stepping into the stall when Harold spoke in his ear.  
  
"A shower. You're making me very jealous, Mr Reese."  
  
"Planning to join me, Finch?" He was pleased that Harold was listening and amused that he'd deduced the shower from the sound of rushing water.  
  
"If … you don't mind."  
  
John grinned, and Harold said, "I can see by your smile that you don't mind."  
  
"You … see me?" John controlled the urge to look around in spite of knowing there were no cameras in his bathroom and no way he could be observed, even with reflective surfaces. He'd installed the apartment's cameras himself and knew exactly where they were.  
  
"There are enough sensors surrounding you now for me to see you in my mind if I focus there." A thrill of mingled alarm and arousal passed through John.  
  
"Really," he said. He stepped into the warm water and heard Harold utter a sound of pleasure as the spray cascaded over him.  
  
Throughout the day before when Harold had guided them, helped them thread a careful path in avoidance of Samaritan's ever growing army, John had believed he was utilizing cameras somehow, whether he said so or not. Now he knew. No cameras.  
  
The reality of what had happened to Harold, was still happening to him, momentarily overwhelmed him; the strangeness of it. He took a deep breath and steadied himself with the ritual of soaping.  
  
As he calmed, he focused on awareness that Harold could see him, not the impossible way it was happening, and he stroked himself to hardness.  
  
"John," Harold said in his ear, mildly disapproving but with a voice like silk, "is that really necessary?"  
  
"I think it is, Harold." He leaned back on the shower wall, closing his eyes. "Stay with me. Are you alone?"  
  
"Yes." Harold's voice was close to a whisper.  
  
"Are you touching yourself?"  
  
"I … yes."  
  
John groaned. He felt both the closeness of Harold's presence and the shameless indulgence of being alone in his bathroom, masturbating. The soap made a lousy lubricant but he didn't care, it was stinging his skin but the hard pumping action of his fist felt too good to stop; especially with the sound of Harold's stuttered breathing in his ear.  
  
"John, you're burning yourself," Harold protested softly. "Turn around, press against the tile."  
  
As soon as he did, the slippery coolness was heaven … all along his hot cock. He could get no friction but the sliding and slithering wetness was good, he just needed more, just a little more …  he strained against the wall and Harold's gasp in his ear carried him where he needed to go, jerking in spasms against the tile.  
  
"Oh my," Harold murmured. "That was …"  
  
"Good," John said, barely finding his voice as he rested, still feeling small ripples, like echoes of coming. "Really … good." He turned around slowly. "Now …  no more distractions. Some of us have to get to work." He stepped back into the spray to rinse off.  
  
"Indeed."  
  
  
***  
  
John clipped his badge to his belt and glanced to make sure the one appliance he did use, the coffee maker, was turned off.  
  
It was time to center his thoughts on the work day ahead. Time to deal with Iris Campbell. Though his last meeting with her was only a couple days past it had shrunk by orders of magnitude in his mind, part of another world.  
  
When he'd told her there would be no more secrets, nothing held back, he'd known he was lying. He'd have said anything at that point to make sure she got out of the city safely. When she'd asked, "Am I going to lose you," he'd told her only to take care of herself.  
  
Walking to the train his thoughts strayed further back to Joss Carter and the dream-like visitation he'd experienced when his body had been near death. Whether it was real, the spirit of Joss or a part of his own mind speaking with her voice, those moments were still vivid; her insistence that there were people who loved him, people he needed to connect with. There is one in particular, he thought.  
  
Balancing with the movement of the crowded subway car, his hand light on the upper bar, he scanned by instinct and habit, faces, potential threats.  
  
"Finch," he said softly.  
  
"I'm here, Mr Reese."  
  
It was the same reassurance he always felt with the sound of Harold's voice in his ear, but more. Whether it was the physical thing they'd begun or the way the sensor network functioned, he didn't know, but it was clearer, closer.  
  
"Do the sensors tell you what I'm feeling?" he asked, casually turning from the transit camera.  
  
"From your body readings I'd say you're very … relaxed."  
  
He scanned the car around him again, smiling briefly … in case Harold was watching.  
  
  
***  
  
Iris Campbell had endured two days suspended in waiting, staying with her sister on Long Island because John had asked her to get out of the city. It gave her some time to think.  
  
With distance came perspective and uncertainty. She knew she'd committed an ethical breach in her relationship with John Riley. It was a pretty serious breach. Even after discontinuing therapy it could be an actionable offense in the psychiatric community, for good reason. The attraction of a patient to a therapist was a given, a part of the therapeutic process. To take advantage of that was unforgivable. The longer she was away from the physical and emotional draw of the man, the more she questioned her behavior.  
  
She watched the news for signs of the danger he'd described but didn't see it. There was a series of rolling brown-outs and a serious fire broke out in an old substation in Brooklyn. There was an eruption of gun violence in the city, some sort of gang war. Could that be what he'd meant? She commented on the violence to her sister -- who waved it off.  
  
"Why are you watching that? The news is always bad."  
  
Thursday morning the world felt not just normal but emphatically normal. Sun shining on daffodils in her sister's garden. Her nieces and nephews ruddy-cheeked in the backyard. The morning news shows were dominated by "feel good" stories.  
  
"Awesome," her sister remarked. "Finally some news that doesn't make you feel like digging a hole and hiding."  
  
Iris found she couldn't think of a reason not to go back to work Friday morning. John's warnings seemed disconnected from reality; deepening her doubts and intensifying a growing belief she should distance herself from him.  
  
He was on the steps outside the precinct when she got there. He looked fresh, as if he'd just showered.  
  
He looked up as she approached and she felt a flutter of fear that she'd once again be drawn in, unable to tell him they were making a mistake. But his gaze was surprisingly neutral. No need, no heat or striving toward her. He was opaque.  
  
"Coffee?" he said.  
  
"Sure," she offered, a little hesitant and somewhat confused.  
  
He gave a brief nod, and said, "Let's walk."  
  
They headed toward Washington Square, speaking only when they stopped to get coffees from a street vendor.  
  
"The truth?" she prompted when it seemed he might sit on the park bench and drink the whole cup without saying a word. "You said you'd tell me the truth if you made it through these couple of days. No holding back."  
  
"The truth," he said, finally meeting her eyes. "The truth is you were right. I have been hiding something from you. From the beginning … there's been someone else. Someone I've never told you about."  
  
"Another woman?" she said. Of all the things she thought he'd say, she never imagined this. It stunned her. Despite her doubts, despite her own decision to disengage from him, it hurt. She felt an angry heat climbing her neck.  
  
"Not a woman, Iris," he said. "A man."  
  
"Oh." Her anger ebbed in surprise. John Riley with a man -- was it possible? Of course it was, she knew. People could bury their sexuality deeply, often self-destructively. She studied his face and it showed every sign that he was telling her the truth. She wondered if this had been the heart of his struggle all along -- his aggressive behavior, the lying?  
  
"For some time," he said. "There wasn't much hope for it, 'til now."  
  
"John." Her voice spilled her sympathy. Mingled with the compassion she felt was the relief of knowing this meant they could part without a difficult exploration of her own reasons. "He knows now?"  
  
"He does."  
  
  
***  
  
Harold listened closely without making a sound. He concentrated on reading John and was careful not to intrude verbally on what he thought must be a difficult conversation with Dr Campbell.  
  
John, however, seemed to be having no difficulty at all. Even without benefit of the sensors Harold knew he was speaking honestly.  
  
In the panoply of changes Harold was working hard to assimilate, the physical development in his relationship with John Reese was one he needed to pay more attention to.  
  
Harold had known both men and women for whom their sexual desirability was, to some degree or another a touchstone, reassuring them of their worth or their power. This sort of person flirted with the world to feel their place in it and to some extent all of their interactions carried a sexual charge. If he cared for someone Harold didn't mind indulging this. Nathan Ingram had been that sort of man. Harold had found it even more true of John Reese.  
  
He'd been aware, maybe not from the start, but soon after, of John's almost coquettish behavior with him; his flirting. Harold enjoyed the affection it expressed. In the course of time his feelings for John had deepened. Truly, he loved him. His appearance, his physical presence gave Harold a lot of pleasure and he was more than happy to give him his due attention.  
  
It occurred to him, as his thoughts meandered, that he also enjoyed looking after him, taking care of him. He never thought any of these things signified more than their profound friendship. Now it appeared to be so, for John. Could he do this, look after John in this way?  
  
The sexual activity was no more than an escalation of basic elements already contained in their relationship, Harold reasoned. Sparked by the enhancement of machine consciousness. That enhancement had afforded him an opportunity; enabled him to see what John wanted and needed. The man's happiness clearly revealed how important the increased attention was, how much physical contact he required. On a surprisingly regular basis, if the past two days were an accurate measure.  
  
Harold was alone, safe on the couch, gazing without particular focus. His eyes roamed the empty seat at the other end of the couch … where John had sat the morning before when Harold awakened. Where John had looked so … desirable, so appealing.  
  
An odd thought intruded, rising unbidden from a deeper layer.  
  
The feelings that the machine's consciousness had enhanced were … his own.  
  
Not John's.  
  
It was an almost frightening sensation for him as his perspective shifted. Not a question of John's needs. His own.  
  
_My need, my desire._  
  
He could feel his heart beating in his chest, his pulse in his throat.  
  
Not something new. For how long? Oh god, Harold thought. The answer wasn't difficult to find. Not hidden. Obvious. If he'd been struck he could not be more shaken. He'd been utterly blind.  
  
"Finch?"  
  
"I'm here," he said, his heart pounding.  
  
"Were you listening?"  
  
"Yes … always," he said. When he closed his eyes, they were full of tears.  
  
  
***  
  
John was still smiling a little when he reached his desk, but not for long.  
  
Fusco seemed subdued. John figured it had something to do with the huge stack of case files at his elbow, and maybe the bruises on his face.  
  
"What have we got?" he asked.  
  
Fusco squinted up at John over the tops of his reading glasses.  
  
"We got a pile, partner, the same pile we had yesterday when you were MIA. All from Wednesday."  
  
"It was a rough night."  
  
"The victims read like a who's who of New York scumbags. They got bodies stacked up at the morgue. Dominic's at the top of the pile. I was there when he got taken out by a sniper."  
  
"Elias?"  
  
"Not one of his -- shooter got him too, I saw it go down. But there was no body recovered. Must have had somebody on the scene. Guess they wanted a private burial." He gave John a look like he wasn't going to say any more but there was more to say.  
  
In his ear, Harold spoke, "I believe Elias has gone to ground, John. He's hurt but he's alive. And John, please give Detective Fusco the phone I prepped for him."  
  
"Grab whatever you need and let's get started," John said.  
  
He didn't take a chance on speaking openly until he'd steered Fusco to a safe zone and they'd gotten out of the car. He made him leave his phone locked in the car.  
  
"This is pretty paranoid, even for you," Fusco said when John signaled it was safe to talk. They were in a narrow alley off Broadway on the Lower East Side.  
  
"Lionel, trust me. There are people you don't want to mess with on the other ends of the street feeds, listening through phones, computers, you name it. Got something for you." He handed him the safe phone.  
  
"For talking to you and him, right?"  
  
"Right. But, do me a favor, be paranoid. What about Elias?"  
  
"How'd you know?"  
  
"Good guess from the look on your face."  
  
"Elias's guys staged an accident. There were a bunch of them in a van, ready with a whole medical set-up in case he was injured. I tracked them as far as Jersey but to tell you the truth I didn't really want to nab the guy. I kinda hope he's okay."  
  
"Ah," Harold said in John's ear, "Bruce Moran. He's hidden his tracks well but I believe he's the one who purchased the property where the machine has located Elias. Two of the three friends from the Boys Home are still alive, that's heartening news."  
  
"So, I'm figuring Harold's okay, and the fruitcake?"  
  
"Both fine, Lionel."  
  
"Something's going on you're not telling me, right? Who's the new power player?"  
  
"Would I keep secrets from you?"  
  
"One of these days, you guys are gonna trust me."  
  
"We already do," he said, and it must have sounded sincere enough to make Fusco grin and wave his hand dismissively.  
  
"Yeah, whatever. Let's get to work."


	5. Chapter 5

  
When John finished work Tuesday night he told Harold he was on his way and bringing dinner. He arrived, laden with food from a favorite Chinese restaurant, expecting a warm welcome. Only Bear was happy to see him. Harold and Root barely glanced his way, both of them in the subway car.  
  
The computer equipment looked like it had birthed a litter of servers in his absence, machinery stretching from one end of the car to the other. Root was wrangling an armload of cables and looked … angry. Harold was subdued, limping slowly behind her from one console to another, trailing her but not quickly or too closely.  
  
"What's going on?" John asked, leaning in the doorway of the car.  
  
"Ask Harold," Root said, roughly dragging the cables.  
  
"Ms Groves, please," Harold said. "I'm no happier about this than you are."  
  
"About what?" John wanted to know. Neither of them spoke. "Someone needs to start talking to me … now, Finch."  
  
"The machine has located Ms Shaw," he said. He stopped at a workstation, looking down at it, one hand touching the keyboard.  
  
"If it were John," Root said, tightly gripping the bundle of wires as she turned to face him, "we'd be on the road right now."  
  
"That," Harold said, lifting his head to meet her gaze, "is … not true. Think. Not so long ago we knew Dominic had John. I wanted very much to go to him … you stopped me. You told me I had to trust the machine to help him. And I did. We have to do the same now."  
  
"But the machine can't help her, it can only watch now." Root's voice was pleading.  
  
"Where is she, Harold?" John demanded quietly. Maybe it wasn't safe for Root to go, but for him …  
  
"No," Harold said.  
  
He gazed at the floor. "She's with Greer at one of Samaritan's strongholds." He closed his eyes. "They're convinced … he's convinced … that they've turned her. But she is much stronger than they think. It's her disorder," he said, opening his eyes, gazing at Root. "It protects her, like a shield. They can't read her. If you went to her now you'd destroy her cover."  
  
John saw Root was listening intently, no longer angry but still flushed, upset.  
  
"Greer believes she's an asset," Harold said. "She isn't. Not to him. Trust her."  
  
"Harry," Root lay the cable bundle down, "I'm sorry."  
  
John relaxed.  
  
"Not necessary. I knew it would be difficult for you but … you had to know she's alive, safe, for now." He shuddered slightly but steadied himself with a touch on the desk nearby. "I think we should stop. We should eat, and then we need to talk."  
  
"Speaking of eating," John said … he was taking a critical look at Harold and was shocked by how he'd shrunk inside his clothes. "You've dropped more than a few pounds in the past week. That can't be healthy. How much energy is this thing taking out of you?"  
  
"He's right, Harry. You're burning through your reserves."  
  
"I believe we have reinforcement calories from Shanghai Joe's," he said, limping slowly ahead of them. The shopping bag of food was on the table, guarded by Bear.  
  
John couldn't be put off the subject that quickly.  
  
"One dinner isn't the answer," he said, unpacking the food. "We need a plan. You have to eat regular meals and if you're going to be stuck down here, you've got to exercise. I'm serious. Food isn't going to fix this, Finch."  
  
To John's surprise, Harold didn't argue. He frowned but that was as good a response as John could hope for. He was already considering training options.  
  
***  
  
Harold had said they needed to talk and he knew his friends were waiting. He was almost ready. He could feel the progress of a deep level dialogue where he and the machine spoke without words.  
  
After dinner, he thought, they'd be ready.  
  
He made a pot of tea and asked them to join him in what was developing into a living room area in the middle of the station platform. Over the course of the past week it had evolved: two couches -- the old one joined by a new one and an armchair.  An improvised coffee table anchored the grouping, made of milk crates topped by an over-sized, faux-bronze tray (a prop Root had liberated from the sub-basement storage for Bergdorf Goodman's Christmas window.) Harold poured tea for himself and for her. John settled into the chair and Bear got up on the couch beside Harold, curling himself small.  
  
"You know you're not allowed," he said gently, but any thought of a reprimand melted away in Bear's beseeching eyes. "It's all right," he said. "Good dog." Bear stretched out and thumped his tail on the cushion.  
  
Well, he thought, here it is. No more stalling. The internal debate had been resolved and there was nothing for it but to proceed.  
  
"The first thing I want to address," Harold said, "is what you call god mode, Ms Groves. We've arrived at a decision and we're in agreement that soon, quite soon, you and Mr Reese will have direct communication with the machine. It's going to become necessary for practical reasons -- which brings me to the second. It's true that we no longer have numbers but there are individuals the machine has identified that we need to help. I can't monitor and translate information quickly enough to keep you both safe in the field at the same time."  
  
He now had their undivided attention. Harold's greatest concern was for her. He tried not to shy away from her intensity.  
  
"Please temper your expectations," he said to her. "The machine as an entity has changed since you were in communication. Its voice won't be the one you're familiar with so have patience."  
  
"Can she hear us, now?" Root asked. "Has she been listening to me when I talk to her?"  
  
"Of course. Always."  
  
"Does the machine speak to you, like we're talking now?" John asked.  
  
"Rarely in spoken words, Mr Reese, mostly in thought and images. There is a level of consciousness where we're in constant communication. Information rises from there." He looked from one to the other of them. "I believe the machine will speak to you in words though perhaps not exclusively."  
  
"How soon?" Root asked.  
  
"Very soon."  
  
Harold set his tea cup on the table and sat back.  
  
"Listen now," he said.  
  
He watched their faces and was relieved to see her smile.  
  
"Her voice is beautiful," Root said. "Beautiful."  
  
She was rising from the couch and heading away. He watched her disappear behind the screen of her "bedroom." He understood she wanted privacy to converse. At some level that privacy was an illusion. There was nothing the machine knew that Harold did not. But he could choose to look away, not to listen.  
  
John was leaning forward to pet Bear.  
  
"The machine suggests you finish your tea, get ready for bed and wait there for me while I take Bear for a walk."  
  
"Really?" Harold said, knowing the machine had drawn John's attention to plans for constructing a simple shower in the station's bathroom.  
  
"I was reading between the lines."


	6. Chapter 6

  
John was hitting his stride on an early morning run through Central Park near the end of May. Later in the day the sun would climb high and warm things up but for now his breath was visible. A low-lying mist clung to the more sheltered areas of the path.  
  
His thoughts ran with him, Harold, the machine. Harold.  
  
John had been pretty sure he was right when he pegged Harold Finch as gay from the beginning, whether Harold knew it or not. His soft manner and his wardrobe were hints, but it was the way he looked at him that sealed the deal for John. Finch never checked him out in an obvious way but John knew when he was looking and what he was looking at. He could feel it and he liked it.  
  
He was used to, and not impressed by, his own looks; but he was sharp-eyed when it came to assessing how others responded. A lot of straight guys were uncomfortable with him, antagonistic or competitive. With women he had to be cautious.  
  
He'd been aware since high school that girls had a way of pinning hopes and dreams on him based on the way he looked; dreams that bore no relation to his own reality. Later, with women, he'd grown even more cautious. The stakes were higher and what they meant by "commitment" was more serious.  
  
He didn't have it in him to give. Marriage, a domestic, civilian life weren't in the hand he'd been dealt. When other guys he knew were obsessed with girls and later with starting families, he was obsessed by a succession of challenges; sports and academics, the military. Discipline, rigorous physicality, a mission; these were the things he could commit to.  
  
In his one effort to take a traditional path, with Jessica Arndt, he'd come very close but ultimately hadn't been able to follow through. He'd been unable to give her what she needed and wanted -- he let her down long before his ultimate failure to save her life.  
  
In his early years undercover he made the surprising discovery that it was relaxing to be in the company of gay men. They tended to admire but not expect anything from him. He could enjoy their attention without being on guard, he could even indulge to some degree in a casual sexuality. The rare misunderstanding was easily resolved. They thought he was straight and so did he.  
  
Harold Finch had turned out to be a perfect fit for him. Attentive enough to make John feel good and elusive enough to challenge him. There was no antagonism, no competition. There was no pining for John to be anything other than what he was. No one had ever understood him better or taken better care of him.  
  
The only problem for John was ... the moment he thought was inevitable, the moment Harold would do something to relieve the sexual tension John felt, never materialized.  
  
It got complicated when he learned about Grace and saw how Harold reacted to certain women. Definitely attracted. It didn't mean he wasn't gay but it might mean he was so deep in the closet he didn't know he was in there.  
  
John had encounters, memorably with Zoe Morgan. She was much the same kind of woman that he was a man -- but it didn't stop him from wishing Harold would stay down on his knees a little longer and with a lot more purpose during a suit fitting.  
  
He would never ask for it. That wasn't his way. More to the point, it was nonessential. He valued what he had and the something extra he thought would be nice to get, wasn't the worth the risk if Harold couldn't give it.  
  
Three weeks ago everything had changed -- the world had tilted on its axis and offered Harold up to him. It was nothing like John's fantasies. He had never imagined the urge to devour Harold when he saw him aroused, how much he'd love the feel of his cock moving in his mouth. John's dick stirred, remembering the softness of skin sliding through his lips, the taste, the sweet urgency to suck. Pleasures he'd never dreamed of.  
  
There was only one thing wrong with the picture; one element that didn't sit right with him and he couldn't shake the wrongness of it. The machine.  
  
The sky was growing light.  
  
"Is Harold awake?" John asked. He'd come to a stop on the path, not avoiding the numerous cameras but choosing a strategic distance and bending forward to hide his face as he stretched out his muscles. He was near the Columbus Circle exit at 59th street and ready to head home.  
  
He had addressed the machine but it was Harold who answered.  
  
"I'm here, John."  
  
  
***  
  
  
Pret-a-porter, Harold thought, not a tragedy. His new clothes were off the rack but he wasn't complaining. They fit. He dressed from the wardrobe Ms Groves had kindly acquired for him. By light-fingered means, he suspected. If she'd stolen the clothes, she'd chosen only the best racks to lift them from.  
  
There were things he missed much more than his tailor -- like sunshine.  
  
The time would come, he knew, but not precisely when. It would be safe for him to venture above ground.  
  
They were making progress in decompressing portions of the memory stored in the briefcase. He wouldn't always be the only home of the machine. And, of course, there was the greater hope, that they would defeat Samaritan. Most of his inner attention was absorbed in that objective.  
  
He settled into his new workstation chair and fastened its safety harness. His first thought, seeing the chair assembled, was that it looked like NASA had designed it for a gynecologist to practice in space. Now he appreciated all the padded supports and the separation for his legs, one of which could bend more than the other. It could roll, swivel, and tilted every which way. Whether he was sitting up or reclining he was safe from falling.  
  
"How did I live without you," he said, resting his fingertips on the controls. He silently expressed his gratitude to the machine.  
  
He heard John ask if he was awake, and answered him, lingering with him when he sensed the park.  
  
He tilted his chair back to let awareness flood him: John's close presence, his healthy body smells mingled with the plant and earth scents that surrounded and clung to him; the wafting aroma of hot pretzels from a nearby vendor.  
  
***  
  
John thought Harold might be asleep in the new chair (or engaged with the unwelcome third party in their unacknowledged threesome) but the blue eyes opened as he walked toward him. John saw he was aroused, the curve of a trapped erection along the inseam of his new pants.  
  
"Day dreaming, Finch?" he said, leaning forward to trace the shape with his fingertips and enjoy the little gasp it earned him.  
  
"I was watching you."  
  
"Now you can watch me more closely. With your eyes open. Do we have time?"  
  
"I think so."  
  
Harold had the flushed look of his communion with the machine. John loved this look on him but preferred to think of himself as its cause. He led Harold back to their bedroom space where armoires now formed a partial wall to separate them from the rest of the platform.  
  
He threw off his running clothes and stretched out naked on their bed to watch Harold undress.  
  
"I just put these clothes … on," Harold said. A mock complaint. He was unbuttoning his shirt but completely absorbed in studying John.  
  
"The beauty of it is," John said, "you can put them on again, later. How many reps did you do this morning?"  
  
"Three reps of twelve for each torture activity. Ms Groves provided cheerleading support."  
  
John ran his hands down his chest, over his stomach and brushed his hard cock just to see Harold's gaze tracking; he spread his legs and rested his hands on his thighs.  
  
Half-dressed, shirt still on, boxers, Harold joined him on the bed.  
  
This, John thought, is what I wanted on those sleepy afternoons in the library … for Harold to look with longing and then do something about it, the way he was now stroking him.  
  
"Can I ask you something, Finch."  
  
"Anything."  
  
"Is it you and me right now, or is it a three-way thing with your machine?"  
  
Harold's hand stilled and he looked at him in a pensive way. John silently cursed himself.  
  
"That's an interesting question."  
  
"Not that interesting," John said. He took hold of Harold's hand to keep it in place.  
  
Harold sighed. "You wouldn't have asked it now if it could wait."  
  
His hold on John's waning erection became more like a cradle than a fist.  
  
"The machine doesn't desire you or … have sex with you. I do," Harold said. "But it's here inside me, part of me."  
  
"Would you ever have done this, any of this? You wouldn't have …" John trailed off, not wanting to say exactly what Harold wouldn't have done. "We wouldn't be here, like this … none of this would have happened." He heard the sadness in his own voice and didn't want to utter another word.  
  
"Probably not," Harold admitted, gently.  
  
John closed his eyes and took a deep breath. All the misgivings that had been dogging him, that he hadn't wanted to look at too closely, were now taking definite shape. _Probably not._ It made everything wrong somehow, false, like he was taking something from Harold that he never would have given. He rubbed at his face with his hands as if he could wake himself up.  
  
Harold moved his hand to John's hip, urging him to turn toward him. John did, lying on his side facing him but his eyes were still closed.  
  
"Is it really so disturbing?" He kept stroking: John's hip, his thigh and back up to his waist.  
  
John's throat felt tight. He was sorry he'd said anything and at the same time knew he'd had to. Never on his most frustrated day with Harold in the past had he felt anything like the disappointment he felt now.  
  
Really, he thought, underneath, he'd known it all along. He'd been too selfish to admit it. Euphoria, Harold had said that first night; that the machine's consciousness was like a euphoria. Like a drug, John thought, like being high. In his natural state, the sober Harold would never have reached for him.  
  
Harold got up and John panicked that he was walking away but when he opened his eyes he saw he'd just gone to the foot of the bed for the folded duvet.  
  
I'm cold, he realized as the cover was drawn up over him. Of course, Harold knew that, he thought dully, he probably knew the exact temperature of every inch of his skin.  
  
But he was incredibly relieved to feel Harold's weight on the bed behind him, slipping under the cover and fitting himself all along his back.  
  
Warm lips pressed the side of his neck and Harold's arm came around him. Something unclenched a little in his chest.  
  
"I'm so sorry, John."  
  
"Not your fault, Harold."  
  
"It's no one's fault," Harold said. His hand was spreading warmth up and down John's side, over his hip and thigh, back up to his shoulder and down his arm. "Any number of things can open a person's eyes. I'm just grateful it happened."  
  
More kisses along his neck, Harold's lips grazed his shoulder, stirring a shiver.  
  
John's breathing deepened, his body relaxing into Harold's embrace.  
  
This territory was new. Maybe as new to him as to Harold. A blow job, a quick release, how had he ever thought that was what he wanted from him. This was he wanted, this … everything.  
  
To be held and kissed, to be enfolded. To be made love to.  
  
Harold was gently nudging him to lie flat on his stomach, rubbing his back and letting John feel his hard cock against his ass. He pushed back against it, inviting, once again achingly hard himself against the mattress.  
  
"I'll only be a moment," Harold said drawing away from him. John heard the bedside drawer open, the tear of a foil packet, the rustle of clothes coming off.  
  
"Lift your hips a little."  
  
John smiled to himself as Harold caressed him with a soft folded t-shirt and created a perfect nest with it under his hard cock. A few days before he'd referred to John's discarded, come-filled undershirt as, "your girlfriend."  
  
"Mine or yours?" John asked, longing for the added frisson of fucking the snowy white softness of Harold's expensive underwear.  
  
"Mine," he said. A simple word, given no special weight, but it carried John's mind into a low, honeyed gear of being in Harold's possession.  
  
John expected him to be gentle and he was, gentle and extremely patient, thorough with the lube; but there was no escaping the impossible opening of his body around the hot thickness of Harold's cock. John panted as he pushed to relieve the sensation of pressure. Then Harold's full weight was on him and in him and John's erection, which had abated slightly in the struggle, swelled huge beneath him and the pleasure was overwhelming -- from his depths to the tip of his cock, from his balls through his belly.  
  
Harold started to move inside him, short thrusts pulling back no more than an inch or two and back in, never leaving him empty. Sometimes smoothly, sometimes with a hard slap into his ass. John yielded completely in a haze of bliss; no thought, no struggle, just the moment by moment joy of being fucked by Harold, secure he'd be taken where he needed to go.  
  



	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because I love the character Elias and couldn't stand for him to be dead. Because I always felt that deep down he was a good guy. And, because of the way he held John's hand in "Witness."

  
New Jersey, a Wednesday afternoon in the foot hills of the Appalachian mountains.  
  
John stepped slowly out of a rental car on a mountain road with his hands raised. A fallen tree partially blocked the way ahead. Harold had cautioned him to pull up slowly and stop clearly short of it.  
  
"9:00, 12:00, 2:00," the machine's genderless voice replaced Harold's in his ear, pinpointing three armed men hidden in blinds in the trees.  
  
"I'm a friend of Elias's," he announced. "I'm traveling with friends of Harold's. My name is John."  
  
Caleb Phipps, their "number," was in the back seat of the car behind him, with Root. They'd defaulted to the old terminology despite the fact that they now received information directly, not via social security numbers. In its new incarnation the machine was not constrained, there was no more "black box." There was only Harold.  
  
A rustling in the distance evidenced a fourth man dispatched with the message.  
  
"The woods are beautiful," Harold said.  
  
"I'll be sure to admire them when these guys put their guns down."  
  
John didn't share Harold's certainty about Carl Elias. Strange times, he thought, to gamble so much on a man who'd once controlled organized crime throughout the five boroughs; a man who had extracted painful returns for his help in the past.  
  
Elias's "all clear," messenger arrived in a scramble through greenery and the henchmen lowered their weapons.  
  
"My friend is going to pop the trunk," John told the nearest one. "There's a box inside with phones and a couple of laptops."  
  
Root and Caleb emerged. He was bearing up pretty well, John thought. Harold had identified the danger he was in early enough to ease him out of his own corporation safely. Caleb had unshakable trust in Harold and had already become suspicious regarding an aggressive contract offer from a company called Nautilus Technologies.  
  
He was their fourth number. The first three had been sent on to meet with one of Root's people in Chicago. Harold estimated that Elias had enough resources to safely take on quite a few refugees. Root had already supplied Caleb with a secure laptop.  
  
They followed Elias's men up a meandering path through the woods.  
  
"His appearance might shock you a little," Harold warned as they walked. "He's much more frail than the last time you saw him."  
  
"Taking a bullet can do that," John said.  
  
***  
  
The man was lucky to be alive, he thought.  
  
Elias was wrapped in a warm-looking robe, seated on a deep couch with a high pillowed back, in front of a blazing fireplace; though summer was quickly approaching, the mountain temperatures were brisk.  
  
A wheelchair sat off to the side.  
  
His smile for John radiated affection. He still looked more like a high school english teacher than a mobster to John; despite what he knew about him. They were alone with Bruce Moran in an inner room of the sprawling, low-built complex. Multiple buildings, difficult to discern from their wooded surrounds.  
  
John, Root and Caleb had been detained for more than hour, albeit quite comfortably, in an outer room. They'd been given a meal and John noted a bottle of good wine on the table. He'd watched Bruce take the phone Harold had prepared for Elias through to the inner room. Bruce had eventually summoned him.  
  
"Please sit, John," Elias welcomed him. "I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. Did you enjoy the wine?"  
  
Harold said in his ear. "His best, to make up for the gunmen."  
  
"I did," John said.  
  
When he headed for the chair opposite, Elias said, "No, here John."  
  
He paused, his expression questioning. "Sit close to him," Harold said.  
  
"Beside me," Elias encouraged, waving him closer.  
  
"Relax and let him hold your hand," Harold's voice was soft.  
  
John sat closer to the man than he otherwise would have. Elias reached for his hand. John smoothly allowed his hand to be taken and held. He sank back into the couch.  
  
"It amazes me, John. My life has unfolded in surprising ways since meeting you, meeting Harold. I had a long talk with our friend. A very illuminating conversation. He is so very … brilliant. Truly. It's an honor to know him."  
  
He paused but John felt no need to comment.  
  
"Harold's trust means more than I can say."  
  
Elias's gaze settled on the fire and he was quiet for awhile. One hand held John's and the other pat it gently before settling on top of it. If anything, it made John think of how a grandparent might hold and caress the hand of a grandchild.  
  
"I have always admired you, so much. I used to think there was a chance I could lure you away from him, that circumstances might present themselves." He smiled and looked at John.  
  
John remained silent. There was no way, there never had been, but there was no need to say it. They sat quietly, companionably.  
  
Mostly, John watched the fire; occasionally he'd glance at Bruce who would offer a small appreciative smile, or slight nod and seemed to be at ease. John found it odd but not unpleasant; Elias's hands were broad, dry and warm. He figured at the very least it meant negotiations had gone well. He started to wonder if the man might be asleep but eventually he stirred.  
  
There was a brief heartfelt squeeze and Elias released his hold. "Please take care of yourself, John. Please take care of Harold. I look forward to the next time we meet. You can send Caleb in as you go."  
  
"Time to come home, John," Harold said. "Caleb will stay behind."  
  
  
***  
  
  
Caleb Phipps was now an official "missing person," stashed for the time being in the care of Elias. There he would ultimately be joined by other of Samaritan's targets; most of them tech innovators whose work was identified as a threat.  
  
They brought a late dinner of Indian food home with them. It occurred to John that in the last two weeks he'd probably sat down to more meals with people gathered around a table than he had since childhood.  
  
He listened to Harold and Root combing through the day's action; part of his attention on Harold's plate, which he'd served him heavily laden with the foods he wanted him to eat, rewarding him with a crispy samosa and rice. The food regimen was crafted not just for gaining weight but for his overall health. His weight had come up a little and stabilized. He was doggedly faithful to the "torture activity" that John and the machine devised for exercise. John was satisfied by his progress.  
  
Elias had apparently been quick to grasp reality when Harold revealed the nature of the threat they were facing.  
  
"As you know, he had already dropped off the grid and become wary of electronic surveillance -- the pneumatic tube system he used in the city was ingenious. Of course, there's no antique infrastructure to take advantage of where he is now. That's why you had to wait for a runner to take a message up the mountain. What I told him made sense to him because it explained what he was already seeing for himself," Harold said.  
  
"You didn't tell him everything. He doesn't know how the machine survived," Root said.  
  
"Obviously, I couldn't reveal everything. He trusted that I have access to a safe technology … and he's willing to help us."  
  
  
***  
  
  
Harold was learning to negotiate the pathways and levels of his inner world. He safely, while brushing his teeth, spot checked a multitude of focal points. As long as the bulk of his attention was centered in his body he was in no danger of falling or fainting. He knew John was in bed, Root and Bear were meandering near the seaport, Shaw was doing push-ups in her expansive quarters at a Samaritan outpost upstate, Grace was asleep in bed in the small town where she'd settled in Italy, not alone, he noted and was supplied instantly with a background check on her partner … his inventory continued through a vast number of friends and assets. He knew if any one focus required his attention that the machine would guide him there.  
  
"Amen," he said softly aloud, reminded of a long lost habit of nightly prayer. He turned off the bathroom's main light, leaving the night-light aglow.  
  
Harold liked whisper-thin pajamas; he found them cooling in the heat and warming in the cold. Despite this preference for himself he was very much in favor of John's nakedness. He had known John's sleeping habits for years, having checked on him regularly via the cameras that monitored his loft. But he hadn't allowed himself to dwell on or enjoy the intimacy as he did now, standing by the bed.  
  
"It's easier to sleep if you get in the bed," John said.  
  
"Is it?" Harold's gaze roamed over him, appreciating him in more ways than he could express; not the least of which was powerfully erotic. "Yes … I suppose you're right."  
  
He removed his glasses, adjusted the light and got into bed, finding his best position on his side facing John. His erection slid along John's thigh, his pajamas hardly more than a veil as he settled against him. He began to explore with his hand, lightly massaging or stroking where he found John's pleasure or need.  
  
The constant graphing of John's body sensors was part of Harold's deeper consciousness, heightened when his attention was directly engaged. He ran his palm down John's side and between his legs to fondle him.  
  
An image rose in his mind of John sitting beside Elias in the glow of the fireplace.  
  
"Did you enjoy holding hands with Elias?" he asked, toying with him gently, scattering touches.  
  
"Jealous, Finch?" It was John's most sultry teasing voice and Harold knew the question had delighted him, both from his tone and the way he pressed himself into Harold's hand.  
  
"Mm. "  
  
"Really?"  
  
"I gave him permission to touch you."  
  
"You … used me as a bargaining chip?"  John's thigh flexed against Harold's erection.  
  
"I did," he said, and registered the heightening of arousal this caused, though he didn't need sensors for this.  
  
  
***  
  
John knew Harold wouldn't lie to him and he also knew Harold wouldn't pimp him out to Elias under any circumstance. He imagined some kind of subtle negotiation had taken place; but the suggestion was enough to excite him. In the darkened room it was difficult to make out Harold's expression clearly.  
  
"Just so we're clear … you know I'd do whatever you asked me to do," he said, vaguely playful but mostly, deadly serious; his voice growing rough with pleasure from the hand moving between his legs and the promise of Harold's hard cock against his thigh.  
  
"I'm afraid … I do know that," Harold answered.  
  
***  
  
Harold felt the responsibility John gave him, the weight of his trust, and always had; not as a burden but something not borne lightly. John's emerging sexual submissiveness was something that echoed the other, more serious ways John put himself in his hands. It was an area Harold had been exploring, semi-consciously and in the constant stream of his dialogue with the machine.  
  
For a moment much of his attention turned inward, even as he continued to caress John. The mingling of the sexual and non-sexual, the playful and profound. The gathering intensity of John's pleasure drew him back to the surface. He pushed the covers away to see him in the low light, tightly erect, his hips restless.  
  
"Be still now," he told him. "Elias wanted a token of trust between us," Harold said, touching him very lightly. "I gave him your hand to hold and he was … very appreciative. Spread your knees apart."  
  
Harold reached under John's pillow. He avoided the gun but found the tube of lubricant and a condom he knew John kept hidden there -- along with several t-shirts he'd swiped from Harold's drawer. He only wanted the lube and condom.  
  
"Hold your knees up and lift your hips. Higher." Harold positioned himself, kneeling between John's legs and worked his well-lubricated cock into him, his movements gradual but unrelenting until he was buried balls-deep.  
Neither of them could last long in this position but he knew they wouldn't have to. John was feverishly aroused and when Harold spit in his hand and rubbed roughly over the head of his cock, he erupted.  
  
Harold felt this from within and without …  deeply immersed mentally and physically in John's powerful body, he followed helplessly; hips wrenched on the edge of pain as the orgasm took him. He scarcely knew which pleasure was John's and which was his own.


	8. Chapter 8

John was going through the motions at his desk on a Monday afternoon in late July. He and Fusco were doing more filing than anything else. It reminded him of taking summer school classes. You were in a place you knew serious work had been done in the past but it was warm and sunny and there was hardly anybody around.

The homicide task force case load had shrunk. Word had come down from on high to shelve the bulk of open files from the bloodbath in early May and an increasing number of cases were being taken over by a new urban branch of Homeland Security. In reality, John knew, it was an arm of Samaritan's security forces.

The superficial calm hid an uneasiness in the department. While most of their brethren paid lip service to appreciating more free time with family, there were some, like Fusco, wondering why. Others were nervous because they suspected department layoffs might be coming if the work load didn't pick up.

John was circumspect. He had plenty of other business to keep him occupied. He included Fusco when he could. At this point he and Root had helped more than a hundred potential targets of Samaritan to escape the city. These were their numbers, individuals that Harold and the machine could identify in the early stages of threat.

Sadly, Harold admitted that most of the people the machine could identify as "irrelevant numbers," people they might have been able to save in the past, were already identified by Samaritan and beyond their reach.

Samaritan was as cognizant of the irrelevant list as the machine was. Far from ignoring these numbers, it dealt with them summarily; swiftly and brutally. In a case where John might have gift-wrapped a suspect for the police, Samaritan favored making them disappear; either through trumped up charges or assassination and elimination of evidence. This was made easier by hand-picked politicians who greased the wheels of legislation, granting broad powers to the ever more oppressive Department of Homeland Security.

The only good development on the job front had been Fusco's quick adoption of John's paranoia. With a well-honed instinct for survival, Fusco learned quickly which names to leave out of conversations, which subjects and buzzwords to avoid and where it was safe to speak freely.

People were grateful for safer streets. The media was full of congratulatory coverage, touting lowered crime statistics. The flip side was growing unrest as people saw their loved ones and associates disappear, some into thin air and others incarcerated for newly minted "crimes against the state."

John looked up from the heavily redacted file in front of him, alerted by distant voices. They were coming from the precinct entrance; serious tones, not the sound of casual exchanges he'd expect on a hot, summer afternoon. And then he heard the voice of the machine in his ear.

"John Reese, move now, walk toward the rear exit."

Fusco shot him a questioning look but John said nothing as he followed the machine's directions quickly, but not rushing. He heard Fusco's phone ringing behind him.

"Remain calm, John Reese. Do not speak," the machine intoned.

Years of experience kept his pace steady and his questions unasked while he was seeing a newsreel in his head of every danger Harold could be facing without him. He understood that in an emergency he couldn't risk Harold's name on his lips in sight of surveillance.

Cameras tracked his progress until he reached the first safe alley on the fringes of Chinatown. There he asked the question that was burning inside him.

"Is Harold safe?"

"Admin is secure. Proceed home."

"You could have … said so," he muttered, coming to a stop, his heart rate normalizing. "What's the emergency?"

"You are the source of emergency, John Reese. Proceed home." Not for the first or last time he wished the machine could stand before him as a man and receive a righteous punch.

"From now on," he said with careful control, "always give me admin's status first in an emergency. Acknowledged?"

"I acknowledge, John Reese. I apologize for not supplying this information at once. Please proceed."

Shaking off the anger, he moved.

John knew the way. He threaded the first of a necessary but frustrating maze of steaming alleys and underground safe zones. He was making his way through one of the many sub-basement passageways that could be found connecting old buildings in the bowels of the city -- passageways you would never know existed unless you worked in one of the businesses above. He encountered a pair of waitresses emerging from a locker room and nodded a casual greeting. When he'd passed them Harold spoke.

"John, you've been flagged for recruitment by local DHS. The recruiter wouldn't have recognized you but if he'd submitted your paperwork it's certain your face is known up the chain of command. Detective Fusco is covering your tracks; I supplied him with details -- your departure to meet up with a CI in Chinatown, which your route will bear out. And John, please understand the machine would inform you immediately of any danger to me."

John didn't respond to that comment, his mind was focused on the best way to evade recruitment.

"They'll expect me to contact them."

"I know, I'm working on it. Your cover has to be preserved but we have to make you … unavailable." Harold sighed.

"Don't," John said. "I know what you're thinking and it's not happening. You're not sending me out of town, Finch. No sudden family emergencies."

Outside once more John paused to lean against a brick wall in the shade.

"It's not what I want, John. We don't have many choices."

"Root gets into a car," he said slowly, "and she runs into me in front of a traffic cam. They aren't looking for guys on crutches. They'll see the X-rays and that will be the end of it."

"Absolutely not."

"If it's any consolation, John," Root's voice, lightly ironic, "I'm willing."

"Stop it. Both of you. We'll find another way."

"We need to act on this, Finch. It has to happen today," John said.

"No," Harold insisted, and in the next second, said, "Oh ..."

His tone was so astonished that John and Root both said, "What?" almost simultaneously.

"John Greer … is dead."

"Did Shaw kill him?" John asked.

"No, but … she's there." The line went quiet for five, ten ... twenty seconds but they could hear Harold breathing.

Then Harold spoke again.

"Ms Shaw," he said softly, "can you hear me?"

John was confused … how could Harold be speaking to her? Then he heard a familiar voice, a voice they hadn't heard in a long time; quiet, with a hint of both puzzlement and amusement.

"Yes ... I can."

 

***

The potential to use the sensors for communication without anchoring devices had occurred to Harold but it was code he'd only dared to nibble at the edges of. He was frightened by the scope and implications … his voice, the machine's voice, potentially heard everywhere the sensors reached … it would be a power no human or intelligence should wield. To speak at will, directly into the mind of a person, to any person ... to all people. The potential terrified him and it was untapped until that hot July afternoon when his need to contact Shaw was paramount.

Up to this point, in its new incarnation, the machine's network had been largely passive, a vast instrument for observation and analysis, with the exception of the phone network created with Harold's assistance. Harold had sensed that ultimately the devices would not be necessary. Now, the intensity of his need spurred him to create the code, internally, at a rapid pace that fingers could never achieve on a keyboard. He enabled the sensors themselves to transmit independently. The machine deployed this nearly instantaneously, fine-tuning it to one recipient.

"Ms Shaw," he said softly, "Can you hear me?" He could see her in a flowered sundress, stretched out in a lounge chair on a lawn beside a swimming pool; her eyes hidden behind a large pair of sunglasses. Greer had slumped in the chair next to hers and looked like he was asleep. A waiter was emerging from the house behind them bearing drinks on a tray.

A familiar voice answered.

"Yes ... I can."

"Excellent," he breathed the word. "Ms Shaw, John Greer is dead, not asleep. We don't have much time. His phone has landed in the grass, it's still active. You must retrieve it and enter the code I give you."

"Mr Greer," the waiter said, "is something wrong?"

He watched her kneel by Greer in the grass as if curious about his condition, her hand on the phone.

To the waiter, she said, "Maybe you'd better call a doctor."

"Enter, Blackwood 000 000 000 10," Harold said, carefully. He hardly dared to breathe as he watched her do it.

Moments later a man with a medical bag was rushing toward them from the house. He began his examination but kept stopping to tap at his ear. Harold knew he was hearing the first signals of a spreading alarm.

"Is he okay?" she asked. The doctor didn't answer her, taking his phone out and staring at it in disbelief.

"Ms Shaw," Harold said, his words deliberate and slow, though she was clearly more calm than he felt, "you have successfully commanded Samaritan to shut itself down. Things will get chaotic very quickly. It's time to come home."

Heart beating hard, Harold watched her rise, take her drink from the bewildered waiter and proceed into the house.

 

***

John found Harold alone, sitting on the couch, staring down into his hands in his lap. He looked up, with some effort, John thought, and smiled with his eyes, if not his lips. 

When Harold held out his arm toward him, John sank down on the floor by his feet to rest his upper body across his lap.

"She's on her way," Harold told him. "Root and Bear have gone to meet her." He drew in a great sigh and stroked John's hair, his shoulders. "Samaritan's forces are coming apart at the seams. It's going to get … ugly, I'm afraid."

"That code," John said, pausing to kiss Harold's leg, rub his cheek against him.

"Our sensors discovered it a while ago," Harold said. "We believed we knew the purpose. Blackwood was Greer's superior at MI-6, the one who betrayed him. Greer killed him for it and turned his back on … on humanity, really."

John was listening but paying as much attention to Harold's body and his touch as he was to what he was saying.

"It's ironic, John. Greer invested all his faith and trust in Samaritan but he gave himself the power to destroy it. We had no means to trigger it." His hand stilled on John's shoulder. "Only Greer himself had the authority. The chance would have died with him if Ms Shaw hadn't been there … the window was so slight … she had to act before Samaritan knew Greer was dead."

"You knew," John said.

"Our sensors monitor much more … intimately. To a camera's eye he appeared to be sleeping."

"Is this the reason you let Shaw stay there?" he asked, hesitantly, sitting back to look at him.

"I didn't let her stay, she chose to. Very wisely, I might add; it was her safest course of action."

John lay his head back down, closing his eyes. Harold seemed vulnerable to him, uneasy in spite of the calm way he was speaking.

"It was among possibilities … that she could use the Blackwood command but we didn't see how. Until I did it," his hand rested very lightly on John's back, "I didn't have the ability to communicate with her. I created that code in seconds … in desperation." He sighed again. "I wish it had not been … necessary."

John could feel how shaken Harold was by what he'd done; it was in his voice, in his touch, his attempts to draw a deep breath.

"Why?" he wanted to ask but didn't because the implications of what Harold had done began to take shape in his mind. The powers of the machine had seemed god-like before, but this power was of another order. It was too much; it was a burden he knew Harold was bearing that he couldn't share or relieve him of.

What he could do, he would; reassert his submission to Harold's benevolent heart and help him to get centered in his body.

Sitting back, John took a deep breath himself, and stood up.

"Come with me," he said, holding his hands out. He was relieved that Harold took them and let himself be helped up.

John steered to him to the bed and undressed him.

His pale skin was smooth where he wasn't scarred, and cool under John's hands and lips. There was a freshness, a light clean scent that was part expensive soap and part … Harold. John wanted to massage him, to use his hands to help him achieve some peace.

John's vision of Harold had gone through changes over time, especially since they'd been physically intimate. It wasn't just seeing and touching him naked that brought about the changes. He'd always read intelligence in Harold's appearance, kindness, and quiet power. Naked, seeing his scars, he'd been struck by his stoicism, his endurance … and a different kind of erotic power in his body, in his very compelling thick cock. John's massage was not erotically focused but he felt rewarded by seeing him become aroused.

He felt some pride, contemplating his strengthened core, manipulating the firmer thighs and arms he'd had some part in helping shape.

This day, the change he saw was hard to put into words. Superficially, Harold was radiant now that he'd been touched and stroked … but it was something essential that had changed, the grain of his skin seemed refined, as if his skin cells had undergone a subtle transformation.

Is it knowing how powerful he is that makes him look different, John wondered.

He didn't know and he pushed the thought aside in favor of kissing the naked thigh he'd been massaging, now hard himself and wanting more sexual contact. He opened his mouth and gently bit him, licked him.

"John," Harold said, "come here."

 

***

It was heaven to be massaged by John's strong hands. Harold felt the tension flow out of him and life flow back in. He felt himself re-inhabiting his body, urged to the surface, to the present and physical pleasure.

"John, come here." He wanted to kiss him. Undress him. Fuck him. John gave him a sidelong glance, disobeying; he grasped Harold's cock and took the head in his mouth.

Harold groaned and closed his eyes. His inner awareness flooded with John's desire … John's erect cock … he was rubbing it against the side of the mattress, his mouth was moist with saliva.

John released him but ran his tongue down the length of him.

"Let me." His voice was a plaintive rasp.

Harold grasped himself, holding his cock away from him.

"Look at me," he said. "Lift your head. Don't … open your mouth."

Harold studied him. John's lips were red and wet; his face irresistible, eyes lambent with desire and a needy flicker of defiance. Harold could feel how badly he wanted to suck, to devour. 

Defiance, he thought, as if I would deny him anything.

He reached to hold John by the nape of his neck and in a very deliberate manner rubbed the head of his cock over his lips.

"You want this in your mouth," he said, surprised his voice was still steady, feeling clouded by love. Moisture spilled from his slit onto John's already wet lips. "You have … my permission," he sighed, giving in to John's hunger.

He had to close down his inner sense of John's responses to keep from being overwhelmed. But he was helplessly aware of how he was rubbing himself against the edge of the mattress as he sucked and of when he came, his mouth opened, releasing Harold's cock as he gasped.

Harold gave him a few moments to recover, stroking his hair, and then he said, "Take off your pants and wait there, just like you are."

There was a fairly soft rug by their bed now but Harold threw a pillow down on the floor between John's knees, for height more than cushioning. He was incredibly aroused and consciously calmed himself. He dispensed with the condom, slathering his naked erection with lube.

John's body, relaxed by his orgasm, opened up to him beautifully. Harold could fuck him hard like this, steadily. He grasped John's hips to pull him onto his cock as he thrust into him, creating a wet slap against John's ass with each rhythmic impact. He let himself expand into the heady joy of possession, thrusting as deep as he could, as long and hard as he could until the end when he held him locked to his groin, ejaculating deep inside him.

Fully grounded in his own skin Harold only knew that John was coming again from the quivering and clenching muscles around his cock.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the original final chapter, finished quickly before season five started. I picked the story back up recently.

On Labor Day weekend Harold and John meandered through a high-ceilinged gallery in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. They were touring an exhibit of ancient artifacts; moving a little more slowly than most of the tourists and students around them. Though Harold was enjoying the exhibit immensely it wasn't their ultimate destination. There was a reserved table waiting for Harold Crane and guest in the museum's restaurant.

Harold had known for a while that Control was searching for him before he let himself be found. She'd begun searching within days of being freed from prison; the "black hole" where Greer had stashed her along with a number of other once-powerful dissidents. Finding Harold Finch and resurrecting the machine was part of the mandate that put her back in power.

Greer had initially convinced her that the machine and the man who built it were gone, eliminated by Samaritan. When she learned later that there was never a positive identification of Harold's body she bet on his survival. If Harold Finch was alive, she told her superiors, there was hope for the machine to be rebuilt.

Harold had made arrangements, via Shaw, to meet with Control in a very public place that would nevertheless provide them with privacy. "I see her," Shaw said. Shaw was on a park bench near the museum, waiting to make contact. "Her team is hanging back but she's not alone."

"It's all right, Ms Shaw," Harold said. "They're here for her protection, not a threat to us. Be … nice." He spoke directly into the auditory system of her body. She was the only person Harold communicated with this way. Root, shadowing her, still heard him through her implant.

Harold paused to inspect a case of ancient jewelry, admiring an ornate Egyptian ring. He felt John close at his back. The machine's eyes might be all around them, seeing more than human surveillance could, but years of training ran deep in John Reese. Harold knew he'd stepped automatically behind him to protect his back, scanning the gallery. Apparently, he'd first noticed what Harold was looking at.

"Nice ring, Finch. Not my style."

"Is that so." Harold was entertained by the comment but wondered if John might actually be hinting that he'd like a piece of jewelry.

"And your style would be … "

"Gold band ... plain." Harold's sensors read John's heartbeat, his respiration, and he knew his friend was ... serious.

Root interrupted. "They're on their way in, Harry. Time for you and your boyfriend to move along."

"Yes, Ms Groves. Thank you."

***

The precautions were a charade for Control's benefit. John knew this, he knew Harold was already aware of her intentions, her security arrangements and would not have agreed to meet her if he'd thought there was any danger. Still, John didn't like seeing Harold alone at a table with Control. Along with Root and Shaw, he was armed and detailed to cover, much as Control was covered by her three-man team. From a distance the six of them could have been seen to form a protective circle around the pair though they blended with the crowd around them. Harold's conversation with Control was obscured by the sound of the cafe's fountains and the multitude of other conversations in and around the museum cafe.

***

Throughout the meeting with Control, part of Harold's inner attention was absorbed by considering the subject of marriage. Marriage to John Reese. It didn't mean much to Harold at this point in his life, apart from the happiness it might give John. For himself, there was no legal status, there was no symbol, there was no ceremony that could make his connection to John any more profound. But it was clearly something John wanted and Harold found no possible drawbacks.

He couldn't help but think of Grace, the woman he had not married. Of Jessica, the woman John had not married. He and John had each lost the person they thought they would spend their lives with. For reasons inseparable from the forces that had brought them together. Not a happy circumstance. Harold felt a resonance there, if not clarity. He resolved, even as he agreed to terms with Control, that he would give John this act of completion.

***

They re-took the library in mid October. On their wedding day.

"I knew you were keeping a secret," John said, turning to him outside the door.

Harold looked at his handsome bride and thought of a day when John had looked, to him, very much as he did now. It was a day he considered pivotal in their history. Their first number, the first mission completed. John had shown up scrubbed and groomed, despite his cuts and bruises, like he'd wanted to present himself in the best possible light. Hair brushed back as it was now, face glowing, an immaculate coat over his suit, his hands in the pockets. Captivating. He'd looked so attractive that day to Harold that he remembered rationing the time he spent looking directly at him.

He'd told him then that he had a choice to make: he'd give him enough money to go anywhere he wanted and make a new life for himself, or he could stay and continue their work. Harold had steeled himself to losing him. A succession of more or less competent men (none as perfect as John) had failed him, some at this juncture.

Harold could still remember the expansive feeling in his chest when John chose to stay and he had realized that all the spit and polish of John's appearance was meant to impress him, not a preparation for leaving him.

Now he said, "I'm sorry I can't carry you over the threshold."

"I could carry you … " John suggested.

"That … would not serve tradition, Mr Reese."

"Are you saying … I'm the bride?"

"I hardly think the obvious needs to be stated, do you?" He grasped the vertical handlebar of door, which was touch-coded, and opened it for John to precede him.

John smiled and offered no argument.

***

In the past the library had seemed like a space out of time and reality to John, with windows shrouded, entry hidden and the floors covered in decaying books. Cleaned out, renovated, he still found it magical, other-worldly. The magnificent stairway shone in contrasting pattered light from the larger-than-life windows, now unveiled and golden with late afternoon sun. The sea of old books was gone but there were still rooms filled with original volumes, tucked here and there, and a maze-like collection in small rooms on the third floor. Harold had created a haven for Shaw in the top floor garret.

"For Shaw?" John said, surprised.

"She was a little upset when I told her we were moving out of the subway." He shrugged. "She's not without emotions, John, they're just … muted."

John felt satisfied that they had come home, though strictly speaking they'd never lived here, only crashed with exhaustion when necessary. But it was the place where he'd spent most of his time with Harold and that made it home.

They'd left their friends still partying in a private hotel suite. John was gratified that the library tour ended in the master bedroom, a room he was happy to find built on a human scale; simply but finely furnished.

He was feeling a thread of apprehension that he couldn't quite put a name to or find the source of. Here they were in a luxurious wardrobe -- you couldn't call this a closet, he thought, with its profusion of racks and drawers and shelving, its padded benches. He was with the man he loved, a man he'd succeeded in binding to him with legal vows, who had put a ring on his finger and spoken the words, "I do."

He could hear Harold moving hangers behind him. John had taken off his jacket, his shoes, and stopped. He felt a chasm of sadness opening in his chest.

"What's wrong?"

Harold had sensed it. Of course he did, John thought, and told himself he should be used to this business of being read by the sensors. It wasn't magic, Harold couldn't read his mind.

"I don't know. Maybe I'm having bridal jitters, Finch."

He thought Harold would come to him. Hold him. Instead he found, when he turned to look, that Harold was standing very still, gazing at him without smiling, flushed with color, his lips slightly parted.

***

Harold had tried to make the day perfect for John and that, he thought, was precisely what was troubling his bride. Though he heard him try to make a joke of it, Harold sensed both his sudden sadness and anxiety. The day, with its abundance of pleasures had carried them to a shore in John's heart that was rock-strewn and treacherous.

It could have crushed Harold if he let it, if he hadn't grasped what was happening. But he understood. He'd reached this point with John before, his mistrust of happiness, his deep-seated conviction that he didn't deserve to have what he wanted, that he was tainted beyond redemption.

There remained a wedding gift Harold hadn't given, one he hadn't been sure of for this day, a day meant to be joyous. Now, Harold knew in his heart, it was exactly what John needed. It was nothing he'd bought, nothing he'd arranged. Contemplating it now, he felt a warm rush of arousal.

"John," he said. "Undress." He was gratified to see that in spite of frowning and a brief hesitation, John was doing as he asked.

"I'm pretty tired, Finch," he murmured and it pleased Harold to hear him voice some resistance.

"Then you'll be relieved to kneel here and rest your arms on this bench."

"I'm not ready," he said, barely audible, going down on his knees and leaning forward on the padded bench.

He was withdrawing inward as Harold went down on his knees beside him. He stroked John's back and felt the chill in his skin, which he, uncharacteristically ... ignored, resting his hand for a moment on the curve of his ass. More or less taking aim. Then he smacked him hard, with a slightly cupped hand on the fleshiest part of his butt cheek.

***

John was shocked when Harold struck him. It stung and he gasped in surprise not in pain. He looked back over his shoulder in disbelief. He saw serious lust in Harold's eyes, and then he was struck again, harder. John braced himself on the bench for the third blow, it was more centered, hitting both cheeks and again, and again and again and again. His blood was coursing hot now and a thick sensation of pleasure was building between his legs. John groaned, arching his back, hungry for more. His breath huffed, his cock unfurled, hanging heavily between his legs.

The blows stopped and he feared it was over until he heard the metallic clink of a buckle opening and the slither of Harold's belt. John rocked in place, eager for the impact. Harold built a slow steady rhythm with the belt, an intensity that was … blissful. It went on and on until John felt himself enveloped in a sweet oblivion of lust. When it stopped, his ass and his cock throbbed in the stillness and his body was subtly trembling.

"I think you're ready," Harold said, his voice like a caress. John felt Harold's hard, slick cock slide between his burning cheeks.

***

It began well, Harold thought. He discovered pleasure in the spring of John's flesh under his hand, the rosy appearance and growing warmth of his skin. It was an act performed for John, something he had planned for his benefit, a wedding gift of sorts. But in the process Harold discovered the hidden gift he was giving to himself. He saw his lover transformed before his eyes.

When he decided it was time to use the belt, he doubled it to give himself more control of where it struck, varying placement but steadily increasing pressure until he found a satisfying rhythm. As he watched, gauging John's responses minutely with both his human and machine senses, he saw all traces of inner turmoil, all the hard edges of John's suffering disappear. His lover's movements became smooth, sinuous, sensuous. The arching of his back, his neck. His lips were parted and the sounds he was making were deep and drawn out. He was resplendent.

Harold thought John was like a rare metal that becomes pure in the heat as it's carefully struck. To fuck him in that state, he knew, was going to be sublime. When he lay the belt aside he admired the blush he'd created, and gently traced a rising welt.

"I think you're ready," he told him and he worked his cock into him, urged deeper and deeper by John's moans of pleasure. The body given to Harold's trust, quivering in the grip of his hands, was hot, pliant, and deliciously receptive.

Sadness was banished.

Night had fallen by the time Harold took his subdued but glowing, well-fucked bride to bed.

***

To see Harold at work in the midst of his multiple screens was soul-satisfying for John. When he'd woken up alone in bed he knew where he'd find him. And there he was, working remotely with Root. Control had put acres of servers, Samaritan's empty husk, at their disposal as part of the brokered agreement. Harold and Root were working on the transition.

John left to go for a run with Bear and found him still at it when he got home. Harold had graduated from his space chair to something sleek and minimal. John had a new choice of deep armchairs with ottomans or couches. He selected a particular chair with an excellent view -- of sky out the massive window, or, of course, of Harold. This is the chair he set his coffee beside. Bear took off, headed for the attic and Shaw.

"Thank you … Mr Reese," Harold acknowledged the tea and organic oat square John had brought him when he set them down in reach. Without looking up from the two most active screens, his hand found John beside him for a brief squeeze of his thigh.

"You're welcome, Finch. How's the install going?"

"Smoothly, so far. How was the park?"

"The squirrel population is intact. Bear found some leaves to harass. In a week he'll be rolling in piles of them."

John relaxed into his chair with a stretch. He'd hoped to find Harold at a stopping point. He'd been thinking: quick shot of caffeine and calories, _sex_ , shower. His butt was still a little tender from the night before, like a good memory more than discomfort.

John tried to conjure up the image of Harold as he'd seen him in this room in the past, in a similar pose, at pretty much the same kind of work. How had he changed?

And then Harold did stop working. He stood up to stretch briefly before sitting back down to his tea.

John thought, _yes._

He felt the gold band on his finger, touching it with his thumb to remind himself it was there as he looked at the man who'd given it to him. People they knew who hadn't seen Harold through the months of their underground exile, attributed the changes in him to his relationship with John, to the prospect of getting married. They said it agreed with Harold; people like Fusco, Elias, people like Zoe.

Shaw had privately told John, more bluntly, "Fucking you looks good on him."

Shaw's presence on the fourth floor wasn't the happiest piece of news for him. He hadn't really thought about how considerate Root was as a roommate until Shaw moved into the subway station with them. The first night of her return she'd looked at the sleeping arrangements and said to John, "You guys are fucking? That's new, right."

She'd shot a look at Root, who shrugged.

"Their business," Root said.

"Well, I'll take the couch," Shaw announced, and John had pointedly not looked at Root, not wanting to see her disappointment.

The next morning, it wasn't just Bear at the foot of the bed waiting to take his place, he'd brought a friend.

"I won't touch him," she grumbled. "I just need to sleep."

John made it a priority to get the woman her own bed. Even with Bear firmly planted between them he was not happy to leave her there with Harold. He could picture disaster all too easily -- Harold would probably melt like taffy in her hands if she put a move on him.

As it turned out, Root was quicker on the draw than he was. By the time he got home that night she had already set Shaw up with a bed down at the other end of the station, near her.

Now Shaw was upstairs, with her own floor of the house. He trusted Harold but ... he put the thought aside.

He liked to think he was responsible for giving Harold more energy, giving him a glow of health, that the exercise regimen was helping his mobility. But … there was something else going on. There was the matter of his glasses. John was pretty sure that regular sex didn't improve anybody's eyesight. Harold's prescription had now changed twice. John had looked through the latest pair and found the correction was minimal.

He put these thoughts aside as well because Harold, who'd been absorbed by work all morning was now gazing at him. John chased the last of his food with a shot of coffee. He had one leg stretched out on the ottoman and the other bent, he flexed it a little, feeling his body respond to Harold's attention.

"I thought you would look good in that chair when I picked it out," Harold said. This was as warming and delicious as a shot of whiskey to John.

"You did? What were you thinking when you bought this?" John asked, pushing the ottoman with his foot. _He_ was thinking he'd like to be bent over it and …

"That it would be ... useful," Harold answered.

"And the soft, fluffy rugs. What were you thinking?" John voice was low and his hand was stroking down his stomach toward his cock.

"I was thinking … " Harold said, touching the rug with the toe of his shoe, "that this one would be kind to your knees when you kneel here, next to me. I also thought it would feel good on your bare skin if you were to lie down here, at my feet."

John had definitely contemplated kneeling there so he could lay his head in Harold's lap while he worked. He'd thought of turning the chair toward him so he could kneel between Harold's legs, face and mouth level with his cock, which is what he'd been hoping for this morning. But to lie there, on his back at his feet was more than he had hoped for … his desire darkened and deepened.

"Would you like me to lie down there now?" he asked in a disappearing voice.

"I think I would like it very much. Leave your clothes there, John, and come lie down here." And John did, heart beating harder, no longer smiling, his body warmer all over.

On his back, his knees bent and spread apart, John felt drunk with pleasure to be so exposed and vulnerable to his lover. The fleece of the rug cushioned him and caressed his bare skin. When Harold's expensive Italian shoe made careful contact with his swollen genitals he thrust up against the hard sole.

"Lie still," Harold told him, and John shuddered, making himself obey. He knew he could come in seconds if allowed, if Harold would press into him.

"Look at me, John." Harold's commands, issued so gently, were irresistible. He looked up and felt grateful; Harold's loving gaze spread the heat from John's groin to his heart.

"Now," Harold said, and John heard the voice as quiet as a whisper as the pressure he needed descended on the head of his cock, crushing it to his stomach; his body jerked and he shook with pleasure, shooting hot into the hard surface of Harold's shoe. Then he lay gasping, gazing up at him from a pool of sticky happiness. Harold gently released the pressure on him and slid out of his shoe.

"I have to get back to work, my love," he said. "And I think you could use a hot shower."

John nodded. He got up, a little shaky. He paused on his knees to be kissed, wishing he could imprint Harold's lips with all the adoration he felt in his heart. Part of him wanted to stay there, to rest against the man's lap, but he rose, taking Harold's shoe to clean, and grabbed up his discarded clothes. He felt foggy, but happy, heading back toward the bathroom.

Passing through the kitchen he met up with Shaw. She was eating an enormous bagel slathered with cream cheese and stared him up and down.

"He spoils you rotten," she said.

"If you don't like it, you could always … move out," he suggested as he passed her.

***

In a church basement in Louisville, Kentucky, four people sat in a room that housed a number of AA meetings every week and once a month a small LGBT support group. Three of the four had responded to a Craigslist post initiated by the fourth.

The post, under _Missed Connections_ read:

Ms Shaw, can you hear me?

"Hi guys, thanks for coming," the author of the posting said. He was a high school student who'd been enjoying summer vacation, swimming in a community pool on a hot July afternoon, when he heard a voice speak inside his head.

"It was incredible, really. Not like a thought in my mind, an actual voice." He had said much the same thing online, emailing back and forth with the three who'd responded. But now they were meeting up face to face to share how the voice had made them feel and discuss what it could mean, try to figure out where it had come from.

***

In New York city, Harold Finch sat up straighter in his chair, and murmured, "Oh dear."


	10. Chapter 10

The unfolding of the machine into the server farms that were once inhabited by Samaritan was a massive undertaking. Overseen by Root and her team, with careful monitoring by Harold and the machine’s organic heart that now resided within him.

His shared consciousness with the machine was fluid, dynamic. The inner protections were strong and had evolved considerably in the six months since their merging. The expansion into the exterior hard drives, however, was posing some challenges for him. To counterbalance the untethering it was causing, he turned to his anchor.

“I require your presence here, John.”

“On my way.” The energy of his run was in his voice and Harold could see Bear racing toward him through the sensors; they were in a field of leaves in the park. He regretted calling them back from this joyful activity but he needed him.

“I’m closer, got it covered,” Shaw said, surprising him out of his communion with John. She was light-footed, heading down from her lair on the fourth floor. 

“I appreciate your desire to be helpful, Ms Shaw, but …”

“Sorry, Harry,” Root interjected. “It’s going to get a little bumpy so we sent in reinforcements.”

He was about to protest when he felt her hands on his shoulders and the contact instantly quieted the sensation that he was about to float free of his body.

“Down, beside me,” he told her. He needed to see her. Her physical presence was not as powerful as John’s, not as keyed to his own. He was hesitant to steep himself in her as he did in his mate but accepted the wisdom of using her to hold on to. The richness of her long dark hair appealed to him and he thought the combination of visual and tactile contact would work.

Strange to see her in John’s place, not altogether pleasing, but centering. He loosed her ponytail and plunged his fingers into the mass of her freed locks. He began to relax; his body had tensed almost painfully to maintain focus and now leveled out. He was drawn in watching her dark eyes grow heavy with pleasure as he massaged her scalp. He read her minutely, she was curiously calm, receptive. The nape of her neck was delicate, soft, but the muscles were strong. The physicality was holding him together; a brace of support in a flood.

 

***

“I’m closer.” He’d heard Shaw’s voice and then he’d been closed out of the connection. “Where is admin?” he’d demanded.

“Remain calm.” The machine’s voice could change, had changed over time, at least in John’s ear. Harold said it was attempting to find a voice that was more acceptable to him. This one, decidedly female, determinedly soothing, made him want to strangle someone. “Admin is safe. Agent Shaw is providing necessary assistance.” Assistance. The thought turned his stomach.

He knew he should be grateful that someone was there if Harold needed … something. If it were an attack, yes. He’d be grateful Shaw was there. This was something else, something intimate and meant for him.

John was on the train, standing in a sweat near the back of the car, Bear sitting but alert, panting beside him. Usually he and Bear walked home from the park but he’d been near the subway entrance and thought it would be quicker and more direct than a cab. Harold needed him, “required him.” Normally, this wording would have given him exquisite pleasure. But he wasn’t there and Shaw was. The thought of what Harold needed and what she might be giving him made the ten minute trip home feel like crossing a bed of hot coals.

“Please, remain calm, John Reese,” the machine spoke again. Must be monitoring heart rate and respiration. Fuck you, he thought, but remained silent as the train rocked. He noticed a small island of space had formed around him and Bear, and consciously relaxed his face.

Forever until he and Bear were racing up the marble stairway. He stopped short, Bear kept going to greet Shaw whom he nearly bowled over. John felt a rush of relief seeing everyone’s clothes on and zipped up. Her hair was loose, which was odd, and what’s more she looked kind of loosened all over. She was kneeling in his place which was fresh agony, a knife in his heart.

“John.” Harold said his name and it snapped his attention, instantly. “Come here.” Shaw cleared out of his way, maybe she knew he’d move her if she didn’t make tracks fast enough. His place. The soft rug, for him. Harold, his. He knelt, alert, hands on his thighs, looking up. Harold’s pleasure in seeing him poured through him and John was able to breathe more deeply into his diaphragm.

 

***

John’s presence was magnetic, potent; it gathered Harold in. John was as solid as the earth. Even the tumult of his emotions captivated Harold, the life-sustaining air of a world where swirling currents and storms co-existed with regions of stillness.

He stroked John’s hair. It was as thick as Shaw’s, rich with his scent. John’s pleasure in being touched was vivid and drew Harold in deeper.

“Tell your machine not to shut me out like that again, Finch.” Harold took this in. Better to let him hear what might disturb him than leave him to his imaginings.

“I think you just did.” He guided John’s head down to rest on his thigh, petting him, caressing his neck. At some level Harold was aware of outpouring data, oceans of movement on a server farm in Utah, but most of his consciousness was centered in his body, in his awareness of John, the warmth and weight against his leg. He was firmly anchored now.

“She’s beginning to purr, Harry,” Root said.

“I’m aware, Ms Groves. A running commentary is unnecessary.”

“I’ll sign off, for now.”

Harold was no longer sure that being a “private person” had the same meaning it once had. There were times he wondered if the word, “person” still strictly applied to him. That was a matter for the deepest communications. Certainly, there was nothing private in his thoughts or actions since merging with the machine. The decision to allow direct access to both John and to Root had ongoing implications; a work in progress. Shaw had declared she didn’t want such an arrangement. “I’ve already got you stuck in here, Finch. I don’t need your machine.”

***

John nudged closer to where Harold’s erection was taking shape, swelling along his hip, still buttoned up in his trousers. He turned his head to face it, inching nearer until he could feel the firmness under his lips. He thought about sucking, about feeling bare skin but was content just to be in contact now. Whatever Harold wanted.

His life was focused in a way it never had been before. It seemed like he’d always been seeking the thing he could commit himself to that would make him good, correct, by virtue of his service. What was good, what was correct had become clouded over time. Impossible to grasp. Now it was simple and clear. It was Harold.

 

***

Shaw brewed a strong cup of coffee in the downstairs kitchen, gave Bear a treat and rummaged through the refrigerator. There was a lot more food down here than in her fridge, where she kept beer and ... mustard. She pulled out a bakery box and lifted the lid on a trio of chocolate covered cream puffs.

“That’s what I’m talking’ about,” she murmured. “These boys like their sweets.”

In her ear, via conventional connection, Root spoke.

“Good job, sweetie. Nice to know Harry’s in capable hands.”

Shaw snorted. “He’s got the hands. All I did was sit there. What do you want, Root?”

“The machine has a number for you. Fusco can help. His ex has Lee for the weekend. Casey is handling the tech on this one. Check in with him at the subway.”

Shaw's mouth was full of custard, cream and chocolate but she managed a semblance of the words, "Got it."

The subway headquarters had not been abandoned. The space had been overhauled and expanded. It was Daniel Casey’s home base of operations. Shaw worked well with him, liked him well enough. Less wordy than Finch. She could do without his attraction to her but she was used to that, it came at her from most men and a lot of women. Part of the reason she liked living with Reese and Finch — they were pretty much indifferent. She knew Reese worried. She could have reassured him that she got only neutral vibes from Harold, but it was too much fun to see him sweat. Just the thought of it made her grin.

Sex between team members was her idea of bad news; destabilizing. If it were anyone else John had fallen for, she’d have warned him off, but Finch was different, the usual rules didn’t apply.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reading the Ragnarok's excellent, Make Them Into Prayers, gave me an appetite to go back and revisit my submissive Reese. This story was begun and originally completed before the final season aired. Not sure how far I'll carry it now but it's like visiting an old friend for me. This time around I've given Shaw a little of her own POV and my readers may recognize a hint of her relationship with Harold from my story Difficult To Name.
> 
> Also, there can never be too much of John on his knees.


	11. Chapter 11

Shaw went back to the subway after leaving the number in Fusco’s hands. She’d brought sandwiches and some coffee as a kind of offering to Casey. She wasn’t aware of being rude to him earlier, and didn’t regret it when she was made aware of it, but Root had convinced her she should make nice.

“You’ve got a bad habit of butting in,” Shaw told her.

“Just trying to be helpful, sweetie. It’s not a good idea to bite the hand that feeds you information.”

“Yours or his?”

“His. I like it when you bite.”

“Goodbye, Root.” Shaw turned off her earpiece. The advice did make some sense. She needed Casey. The guy was good at intel, even if he had that natural-born prey look to him. Soft, like a bunny. He was startled to see her come back but pleased with the offering. She could practically hear his stomach growling.

“How does it feel to have a cult named after you?” he asked her, unwrapping his sandwich.

The press had come up with the name Shaw People to describe the small groups that had sprung up around the country; the unintended spillover from the first contact Finch made with her. Apparently, even geniuses and artificial super intelligences could fumble. The bug was fixed in microseconds but not fast enough.

“I asked Finch to let me infiltrate but he didn’t go for it. He’s a little touchy about the whole thing.” 

Casey was one of very few people who knew as much about Harold as the core team knew. Caleb, Daizo, and Jason Greenfield were the others, all three working with Root.

“I’ve been keeping an eye on the groups,” he said. “The numbers have topped out, so that’s a good thing.”

“People need to get a life.” She bit into her sandwich. Heavy on the mustard, both kinds, just the way she liked; the earthy spice of the brown mixing with the sharp vinegar tang of the yellow. It was almost better than sex. Almost. Maybe the Shaw People weren’t the only ones who needed to get a life, she thought. Her only remotely physical relationship at the moment was cuddling with the dog.

She found herself appraising Casey and abruptly shook it off.

 

***

 

The physical changes in Harold’s body were a subject of internal debate at multiple levels, most where language was not necessary but there were questions he consciously framed. Why should he, and not all people benefit from this biotechnology, how far was he willing to allow it to progress. He’d halted the work at a certain point, unwilling to become unrecognizably altered to the people in his life. Some greater mobility, the improvement in his eyesight. It was much appreciated. Though he retained a slight limp, the chronic pain was a thing of the past. The degree to which he could turn his head had increased though it was an ingrained habit to shift his body, likewise his upright posture, second nature.

He felt the physical differences in making love to John, the increased mobility of his hips, the strength in his body and stamina. Even as it gave him pleasure, there were threads of concern.

About John’s pleasure, he felt nothing but happiness. His bride, his husband, his … human.

In the quiet of resting, both from making love, and the crisis threshold of data transfer, Harold examined the new thought of John as his human, the implication of his mingled perspective, identity. Was there such a thing as a spectrum from machine to human, when one considered artificial intelligence. He would have said no until six months ago. Now he sensed his own existence might belong on that spectrum.

Ironic, that John could find no easy way to relate to the machine. Its view of him was worshipful. As Harold kissed John’s shoulder, holding him close, his cock detumescent inside the man’s body, the vast consciousness of the machine absorbed human sensation through him, loving John as he did.

He consciously turned that perspective aside, closing his eyes, savoring the salt taste of his skin.

 

***

John was reluctant to go into the precinct the following morning, reluctant to leave Harold. The business of the server farm in Utah was resolved, according to the machine, according to Harold. Danger passed.

“It’s safe, I promise you,” Harold told him.

John wasn’t so sure. Danger still lurked and it had nothing to do with miles of servers.

Harold was looking well-rested, freshly showered and shaved; seated at the kitchen island with a cup of tea. John served him a plate of scrambled eggs and toast, noting how good he looked, how healthy.

They hadn’t talked about it but John wasn’t blind. Forget what he saw, he felt it. He knew Harold’s body was changing. He knew it intimately; how easily, quickly the man got hard. Each degree of mobility in those hips slapped him in the ass. He suspected the real reason Shaw had gotten called in was the ratcheting up of Harold’s needs. This was a man who, once upon a time, didn’t even notice John languishing in front of him with a hard-on; whose need for sex was virtually nonexistent. No longer true. In the beginning when the machine consciousness overwhelmed him, Harold had just … checked out. Now he apparently needed to fuck someone. John was determined that that someone would not be a little brunette with big brown eyes and few boundaries.

Harold looked at him, questioning, as if he could sense his train of thought. That, thank God, was not one of his lover's machine-enhanced senses. John was more or less ready to head out, but lingering, watching Harold eat.

“Is something wrong, John?”

“Just thinking I’ll try to be home for lunch.”

He clipped his badge to his belt. Though he fed Harold well, he tended to feed himself like a cop; he’d be grabbing something on his way into the station. He paused by Harold for a toast-flavored kiss and found himself stayed by a hand at his waist, the world’s smartest blue eyes gazing into his.

“You look particularly handsome this morning, detective, if somewhat needlessly worried.” The tone of Harold’s voice made him want to sink to his knees. He kissed him again.

“See you in a couple hours, Harold.”

 

***

“Why you are loitering on the stairs, Ms Shaw?” Harold became aware of her hovering out of sight on the third floor landing. Bear sitting still beside her.

“Just waiting for the big guy to clear out.” He heard them both coming down the back stairs.

“And that would be, because …” he waited for an explanation. He’d noted friction between her and John and thought it might be getting worse, not better.

She came into the kitchen and headed for the coffeemaker. Bear headed straight for Harold who fed him a corner of toast with a little egg on it.

“Because it’s too early in the morning to deal with him.” She poured herself a mugful and took a seat on the stool across from him. “He does make good coffee.”

“It seems to me the two of you used to get along better.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, Finch, he’s pretty territorial. I'm surprised he hasn't pissed on the back stairs to warn me off. Doesn’t like me getting too close to you.” As she said it she gave him a mock seductive look.

Harold knew John had reservations about her living at the library. He thought it was because he considered her presence an intrusion on their privacy. It had not occurred to him that he viewed her as someone to be jealous of. He eyed her slightly askance, still not sure that made sense.

“It doesn’t seem likely he would see you as a threat.”

“Thanks a lot, Finch.”

“No slight intended.”

“He trusts you. I’m the one who sneaks in and steals the pastry. Speaking of which, are there any of those awesome cream puffs left?”

In those terms, Harold could glimpse the possible cause of John’s worry and the machine’s safeguard of blocking him out the day before. For all his own intense awareness of John, the man’s jealousy had failed to register as a serious concern. Probably, Harold thought, because for him, John was singular. The beginning, the end, and everything in between.

How to reassure someone who should need no reassurance. Harold put that thought on the back burner in favor of giving Bear his breakfast. Then he’d take him for his morning walk. While they were out he could stop at the bakery to make sure there was something on hand for both his beloved and the pastry thief.


	12. Chapter 12

Harold was in a small park with Bear. A pocket park not far from the library. Not as good for exercise as the acres of Central Park, but there was a lovely open area where Bear could play on the grass. Harold was smiling at the dog’s antics with a stick he’d unearthed in a drift of oak leaves; it was then he got the first intimation of eerily familiar code.

Code that carried a hint of Samaritan; a fragment. He momentarily stilled, clinging to consciousness as his attention focused on Jeremy Lambert in a clean lab room in California. He wasn’t working with the code himself, but he was present. The scientist seated at the console in front of Lambert, his name … Robert Ford. Screens of information about him unfolded in Harold’s mind. There was no connection to Greer, to Decima, but there was one to Arthur Claypool. 

Bear’s whine, the nudge of his nose brought him back to himself. The Malinois was gazing up at him, the stick he’d been playing with, abandoned at Harold’s feet.

“I’m okay, Bear. Good dog.” Harold reattached the leash to his collar and fed him a treat from his pocket. “Let’s head home.”

Samaritan. Just a fragment, not enough to rebuild from. Harold thought of his old friend Arthur with a wave of sadness for how the man’s work had been stolen and perverted, now once again in potentially untrustworthy hands.

“Harry?”

“Yes, Ms Groves.” He took in a deep breath. It was still remarkably warm for November. He was oddly disappointed not to see his exhaled breath in the air. “Are you going to go out there?” he asked her, assuming she knew what he knew now about Lambert. “Ms Shaw could join you. She might enjoy the distraction of a trip.”

“Much as I’d love to take the girl off your hands for a while, the boys and I have it covered. You’re better off with two guard dogs. Well, three if you count Bear.”

“I see.” Harold sighed. An easy out for the tensions at home evaporated.

“You shouldn’t worry too much about John and Sameen,” she said. “The big guy has a tendency to brood and he’s been possessive of you … pretty much since you took him in. She likes to tease him, you can’t change that. I honestly believe the pair of them are happy … for them. You should know by now, happy isn’t their strong suit. ”

“There is some truth to that.”

“Glad to be of help, Harry.”

“Root … please be careful. This scientist, Robert Ford, there’s nothing in his background to indicate that the direction of his work is dangerous, but we know Lambert, what he’s capable of. Please … exercise caution.”

“Absolutely.” There was a pause. “Nice to know you care.” Her voice was light but filled with affection.

“Of course, I care.”

“Harold?” John’s voice was quiet but adamant and Harold wondered if the machine had alerted him on a delay to allow Root first contact. She discreetly disconnected.

“I’m fine, John. I received some unsettling news while Bear and I were in the park. Momentarily disorienting. I’m all right now.” The machine had surely told him as much, but better to say so himself. “Bear and I are going to visit Patisserie Maurice.” Home of sumptuous pastry, much loved by both of them, and apparently their light-fingered upstairs neighbor.

He allowed himself a glimpse of John without dwelling there; jacket off, sleeves rolled up. There was something erotic about his gun harness. Could be the suggestion of binding, of bridling. John was alone, in a somewhat private area near a bank of file cabinets. Harold stayed with the connection though they were sharing only the sound of one another breathing. He saw John’s smile when the bell chimed over the bakery entrance as he opened the door.

“Eclairs,” John said.

“That is … an excellent suggestion.” The combined mental image of John and the bakery aromas of warm butter and sugar, toasted almonds and vanilla, were like an aphrodisiac for the soul. “See you soon, John.”

In addition to the eclairs, Harold chose a selection of cupcakes. Autumn themed creations. “A lot of pumpkin flavor this month, Bear.” His long-suffering dog refrained from even leaving a nose print on the showcase glass. Harold rewarded him with a treat from his pocket when they stepped back outside.

 

***

 

John plowed through the paperwork on his desk with a will. Fusco was impressed.

“Jesus, pal. Got a hot date?”

“You could say that.”

With the death of Samaritan, its covert army, in the guise of a bulked up Department of Homeland Security, had stumbled and faltered. There was a brief eruption of power struggles, individuals trying to appropriate the authority of the obliterated AI. A flurry of contradictory mandates sent confusion through the ranks all the way to local police, but leaders like Control herself, re-emerged to exert power, bringing a semblance of order to the chaos.

The new order slowly filtered down to the precincts, normalizing operations as the urban arm of DHS dwindled to nothing. Cops back on full schedule at work, grumbling about the hours but quietly relieved to be doing their jobs again. The bulk of new “crimes against the state” became unenforceable, the subject of widespread judicial review.

John had become a cop to hide from Samaritan. He thought he and Finch needed to talk about whether it was necessary for him to continue. He would prefer to be working the numbers more steadily. He would prefer to be filling out fewer forms in triplicate. He would prefer more flexible time to watch over his primary number, Finch.

Fusco was sharp. When John had finally set him straight on the basics of the machine, without the detail of the merging, Fusco had given him a grim kind of smile. The talk took place while they were on a stake-out together in early September. Harold had suggested it was a good time to explain some things to his partner. It was no longer more dangerous for Fusco to know than be kept in the dark.

“Figured it was something like that. Carter used to say the professor probably had a big ass computer hidden away somewhere, spitting out info. Guess she was close. Scary to think there were two of ‘em. Like Robo-Warriors or Battlebots. Only smart, and for real.”

The former dirty cop had become a decent one. He deserved a better partner, John thought, real police. It also bugged him that Shaw had become the go-to asset on the numbers because she had no second job.

“I might be out for the afternoon,” he told his partner.

“There’s a shocker,” Fusco grumbled.

“Call me if something comes up.”

John was still unhappy about Harold’s near incident at the park. The machine had reported, “Admin experiencing dissociation. Stabilizing. Admin stable, ambulatory.” John had calmly headed for the first square foot of space not occupied by cops, to contact him. He was anxious now to get home and find out exactly what had happened.

 

***

The gun was safely stashed but Harold had asked him to leave the harness in place. John had looked at him, a question in his eyes, and Harold saw that just the request, a requirement to fulfill, had warmed his partner, quickened his pulse.

Harold turned his chair toward him and said, “Here, John.” He’d been anticipating his arrival, feeling the stir of arousal as he sensed his approach to the library.

Dominance, submission. These were words he would never have thought to apply to John or to himself, before, but his partner’s beauty, the way he offered himself, summoned unexpected desire in Harold. It wasn’t a feeling of power that rose in him, seeing John kneel in front of him. It was appreciation. It was as reverent as it was sexual. He ran his hands alongside the straps of the harness that framed John’s shoulders. Massaging the path they delineated, finding pressure points with his fingertips in his shoulder blades, then up again and down the front, caressing his chest. John gazed at him with half shut eyes, his attention moving from Harold’s eyes to his lips.

“You’re … irresistible,” Harold told him, leaning down to kiss him, letting his hands come to rest on the broad shoulders. John’s body sensors reflected the heat Harold could feel in the kiss.

***

Talk could wait. Lunch could wait. He had Harold’s attention the moment he entered the room and wanted to keep it. He took off his jacket and unholstered his gun. It surprised him when Harold asked him to leave the harness on … in a tone that suggested he was turned on by it. It made John aware of how it felt on his body, framing his shoulders, accentuating his chest. There was some tension in wearing it, Harold’s fingertips caressed the sensitive places along the edges and John thought about what it would be like if his cock were bound by straps and Harold traced that binding. His cock had been lengthening, filling, and now it swelled full in a rush as Harold kissed him.

The kisses became light, pressed at the corner of his mouth and Harold’s hand slid into his hair. Then Harold sat back and guided John’s head downward to his lap. Inside, John murmured, thank you, seeing how aroused he was, his erection thick and straining the crotch of his pants. For Harold to hold him against it and move his hips to rub him with his cock intensified his own need, made John’s mouth water.

“It’s for you,” Harold said. “Your hands, your mouth.” Mine, the thought echoed through John. Warm, silky skin under his lips and tongue, he licked the length of him before sinking down. His own cock was throbbing and the tiniest friction against his own constricting underwear made his muscles clutch with pleasure as he lost himself in sucking.

He handled him gently in the aftermath, despite his own body’s feverish state. It filled him with a sense of rightness to subordinate his desire … a deeper need was fed.

Harold was set to rights and John loved the sight of him, just so. His clothes straightened, his body peaceful and his face relaxed, still flushed with color. The affection in his eyes bathed John. He rose up on his knees at Harold’s urging, to be kissed.


	13. Chapter 13

“Hi sweetie.”

“What do you want, Root?” Shaw was on her way back to the library from the subway station.

“Just a friendly heads up to use the back stairs when you get home.”

“Why? Are they doing it in the kitchen?” Not good news if they were. She was hungry and had been planning a pitstop to check out the fridge on her way upstairs.

“She didn’t give me details, but I think you’ve got the general idea.”

Shaw thought of the back stairs as “hers” but disliked being told to use them. It could mean the boys were out in the workroom. When she reached the second floor she moved quietly to a spot on the landing to take a look in the kitchen. If the coast was clear she could grab something to eat. Her earpiece buzzed, she shut it off, uninterested in another warning from Root. Her peek around the corner met Harold’s gaze from across the room. Damn. Damn Finch and his fucking sensors. Following the guy had always been a challenge but sneaking up on him quietly, always a moderate source of amusement. Being unable to was an on-going pain in the ass.

His expression said, it’s your own fault if you’re seeing something you don’t want to see.

Reese was flat on his back on the island counter, bare-assed naked. His bent knee only partially hid something that looked too oddly white and fluffy to be his hard dick, but there was an open bakery box next to him and … fuck, Harold had a smear of whipped cream and chocolate on the side of his mouth. 

She turned on her heel and grumbled her way up the next two flights of stairs. Bear was at her place, sprawled on her bed. He lifted his head at her approach.

“Can’t blame you for hiding up here,” she said. His big brown eyes were soulfully sympathetic. “What the fuck. I eat off that counter.” She stretched out beside him and scratched his ruff, which Bear loved.

“What do you say?” The dog’s eyes had half shut and he nudged her with his nose. It made her smile and she said,“You’re right. He’s spoiled rotten.”

 

***

“I’d like you to stretch out here for me,” Harold had said, running his hand over the kitchen island’s counter. “Without your clothes, please.”

With his knees bent John could fit himself on the length of the island but it was like wading into cool water, especially when he flattened the small of his back to the marble surface. A folded kitchen towel cushioned the back of his head and Harold’s warm palm moved over his tightened nipple, followed by his very warm mouth and John shivered. The marble heated under him as his body temperature climbed. His cock began to unfurl.

He was offered a bite of an eclair. Pastry cream and chocolate in his mouth and Harold stroking his cock, this was heaven. He gripped the edges of the counter to steady himself.

He thought Harold might smear some of the cream over him and lick it off but it shocked him when he slid the entire length of it down his shaft until the head of his dick poked through the tender pastry, like the world’s softest, sweetest fuck. He was coated in whipped cream, custard, chocolate and chou, and Harold began to work on eating it off of him. Biting him through the pastry casing, sucking and licking the cream from around his throbbing cock. It slid messily, spilling on his balls, smearing on his inner thighs, dripping between the cheeks of his ass. The tonguing there almost ended him.

“Cheating,” he said, when Harold transported fingers-full of filling and torn pastry to feed to him, but he opened eagerly to eat it.

At one point Harold stopped, his hand splayed on his belly to still him. Does he want me to beg? John wondered; he would. He felt swollen and sticky and needy.

“Oh god,” he breathed, opening his eyes, ready to plead, loaded and so ready. He groaned when he saw him lowering his head and the warm mouth enclosed him again in blissful moist suction. Seconds later he was coming in hot rushes.

“I’m dead,” he whispered, watching through barely opened eyes as the man he loved tenderly washed him clean.

“Welcome to the afterlife.” Harold smiled at him and kissed John’s knee.

When he was finally cleaned up and dressed, he wiped down the counter himself, one more time, to prepare it for actual lunch.

“Shaw would have a fit,” he said. Harold’s eyebrows raised, glancing past him.

“Get over yourself,” the woman said from behind him. “Just tell me there’s something unmolested left in that box.”

John grinned and pushed it toward her on the counter.

 

***

Harold considered Root’s assessment, that the pair of agents were actually happy. It was a reassuring thought. He knew well enough how John mistrusted happiness, how it went against the grain of his harsh self judgements, against the grain of his need to be on guard. Shaw lived her life in a world that didn’t include the brighter shades of happiness. Even so, as he’d come to know her emotions and states of mind, their subtleties, he thought it was possible she was happy, for her.

The two of them seemed fine together later in the afternoon when a number came up to work on.

Harold had shifted much of the tech side of the numbers to Casey during the process of taking over the empty Samaritan servers. He checked in when he sensed it was needed but otherwise was maintaining a distance. It could become a permanent change. He was toying with the notion of … unplugging, to whatever extent it was possible.

There were ways in which he now felt he knew too much, that the intelligence of the sensors was too invasive to be applied to the numbers, except in cases of emergency.

A division was developing that needed to be tracked, between the living sensors and the machine’s electronic surveillance. Harold, alone in the library, retreated to the bedroom, feeling somewhat shaky. He stretched out on the bed as a precaution, to submerge his awareness in the deepest layers of the machine’s consciousness.


	14. Chapter 14

A wedding at the Plaza Hotel. Their latest number was the father of the bride. John thought Casey had done a pretty good job at placing them. Shaw was tending bar. He was squiring the ex-wife and still mother of the bride, her paid escort.

“Cash outlay to eliminate her original date,” Casey told him. Adding, “Zoe Morgan’s personal recommendation put you first in line to replace him. Harold tipped me off to call her. She was extremely helpful.”

“She’s a very … helpful person.” John could tell his stock had risen in the kid’s eyes.

The ex-wife was an attractive woman. Casey had dubbed her, “Mrs. Robinson.” Her choice to hire an escort spoke more to her impatience with dating and desire to present a particular image, than a lack of options. Definitely not hurting for money, considering the fee she was paying for his services; it wasn’t her ex’s money she was after.

“Jealousy maybe, anger,” John murmured. “The new wife is younger than their daughter.”

She’d appraised him with a cool eye when he met her at the hotel bar.

“Not bad. Nice suit. Be a good boy this evening and there will be a nice tip for you afterwards.”

“I’ll bet you can be a very good boy.” Shaw’s voice had been low and dirty in his ear and John had ignored it.

“The job is simple,” the woman said. “Fetch my drinks, stay close, speak little. If anyone asks, you work on Wall Street and you’re not at liberty to discuss business. And you’re crazy about me. Got it?”

“Not a problem.”

His date appeared to be a somewhat uncomfortable presence for many of the guests; there was a strained cordiality at the reception. No outright snubs, but there was an undercurrent.

“Nobody has anything good to say about the number. Or the ex. They like the kids.” The sound of ice tumbling into glasses and the whir of a blender underlay Shaw's comments. 

“At least the ceremony went smoothly,” Casey said. He tended to keep all the links open so there was a fair amount of background noise that John had to filter out, mostly coming from Shaw’s mouth. She was having a little too much fun with his cover.

He was headed for the bar.

“Speaking of smooth … “ she said.

The venue was lavish, the crowd wealthy, but despite servers circulating with the newlyweds’ signature cocktail, there was a healthy gathering around the open bar; guests loitering and talking in close proximity to the free booze.

She looked up at John. “Something for your lady friend?”

“Dirty Martini. Make it a double.”

“Yes, sir.” Shaw splashed the martini with a hit of olive juice, and poured a top shelf scotch on the rocks. He hadn’t ordered it but it looked good until she popped a cherry in it and stuck in a pink paper umbrella. “One double Dirty Martini,” she said, “ … and one Shirley Temple.”

John removed the cherry and umbrella, giving her a look she’d earned. He took the drinks, glancing back to see his date watching from a distance.

 

***

 

Harold’s communion with the machine lingered on into the evening. To the extent he was aware, it was like a state between waking and dreaming. He was manipulating colored blocks; richly-hued smooth objects that were pleasurable to touch. He was assembling them, balancing shapes and shades with a purpose. He lifted one to examine more closely and saw within it … a woman’s bejeweled hand, golden bracelet, fingers bright with rings, shiny red nails tapping restlessly on a beaded clutch.

“Ms Shaw,” he spoke aloud, softly, in the stillness of his bedroom. “Please tell John that she has a vial of thallium in her purse.”

“Got it, Finch.”

 

***

Shaw’s voice in John’s ear, helpful for once.

He looked at the glittering clutch on the table, the woman’s fingers touching it, a nervous tapping. He lay his hand over hers, which shocked her. Her look was … not pleased.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she said. He gave her the full on weight of his gaze.

“I should be asking you that question. It’s very dangerous, what you’re contemplating.”

Her eyes widened. The rise of color in her face, on her throat, told him Finch was right. Not that he’d doubted him.

“How? You couldn’t,” she breathed the words, staring at him. He slid the purse out from under her hand and her eyes darted around them to see if anyone was overhearing, watching. Their closest table-mates had moved on to the dance floor.

“Doesn’t matter how I know. Your ex, he’s not a good man but this isn’t the answer.”

In his ear, Shaw, sounding fed up, “No shit. Slap on the cuffs and let’s get the hell out of here.”

Casey cut in, “She hasn’t done anything she can be arrested for, John, get the vial and warn her off.”

Option two was the path he took. By the time he left the woman at her suite, she was convinced, if not of the error of her ways, of the fact that he’d make sure she wouldn’t get away it.

 

***

 

Harold was at work at his computer. For the moment, the keyboard was his anchor. He’d come to on the bed with a sense of having played with blocks, like a child, with a very serious purpose. He was also aware of contacting the team on site at the wedding, via Shaw. It disturbed him to know he could communicate that way without fully regaining consciousness but he was also relieved that the pertinent information had been communicated. It was not a good development that the machine was currently avoiding direct contact … with John.

The contact with the keys, the action of typing was something Harold enjoyed very much. He’d sometimes wondered if pianists felt a similar physical joy in transmitting thought through their hands to create music. That would be an amazing thing to experience.

This traditional means of working with the machine, the basis of years of contact seemed appropriate. It was imperative that the connection between the machine as it was at the time of compression and as it had become since, be as smooth as possible. He knew too well the dangers of a split in which two differing identities emerged. What he sought in play with the inner mechanisms, and now at his keyboard, was the creation of pathways for peaceful integration. The lessening of his own physical tension as he worked was a good sign that he was succeeding.

Lifting his fingers from the keyboard, he took a deep breath. He sensed John approaching and turned to Bear.

“He’ll be here soon.”


	15. Chapter 15

Flanked by Bear and John, Harold enjoyed strolling the paths of Central Park at night. After 9 PM there were a number of dog-friendly areas where Bear could play off leash and he had some regular playmates. They settled on a bench to watch him meet and greet two of his favorites, a shimmering Golden Retriever named Florrie, and a Terrier named Jack.

They sat quietly, watching. John’s arm came around him along the back of the bench. In the mild air, for autumn, his coat was open and his long legs positioned subtly toward Harold, who accepted the unspoken invitation to stroke his thigh.

“Harold, why did you contact Shaw tonight, instead of me?”

Harold could feel the muscle in John’s leg tense slightly under his hand.

“Circumstances. Did it disturb you?”

“I wondered why.”

“I was not … fully conscious at the time. I became aware of the vial in the woman’s purse. I saw it during a meditation. The nature of my connection to Shaw made it possible to communicate without fully emerging.” There was no lessening of tension under Harold’s hand.

“Why didn’t your machine give me the information?”

“Lately you’ve been uncomfortable with its voice so it has tried to limit unnecessary communication.” Harold could sense his irritation in the micro flex of his muscles, in his breathing.

“It’s feelings are hurt?” He said it blandly but knowing John, Harold heard the contempt.

“I’m saying your discomfort … is a factor in choosing among options.”

John sighed. “Is this something you want me to fix?”

“No, John. It’s just an answer to your question.” He pat him gently though it did no good.

 

***

John was annoyed when he stopped to wonder why Harold had communicated with him through Shaw at the wedding. In general, he wasn’t crazy about Shaw’s more direct connection to Harold; at odd moments he was jealous of the intimacy. Harold speaking directly into her mind. He’d thought about asking for the same connection for himself but knew how much Harold regretted having created it to begin with, so he’d ruled it out.

Adding the machine to the mix was worse.

He didn’t want to talk about Shaw and he definitely did not want to discuss the machine. He wanted the quiet back, the moment before when he was enjoying Harold’s warm hand on his leg.

My own fault, he thought. As usual.

Bear came bounding up to them with a stick and John took the opportunity to get some distance. He walked out into the field and put some muscle into the throw. Bear brought it back, along with a pack of his friends. John threw it again and it sailed.

He touched his ear.

“I’d like a private talk, with the machine.”

“Yes, of course,” Harold said.

“Can you hear me?” John began, though he knew he was heard loud and clear.

“I hear you, John Reese.” It was the genderless voice once again. His, in turn, was soft but vehement.

“Get … a fucking grip. When you have information for me, just deliver it. None of this re-routing or coy bullshit. You want human feelings? Better learn to live with them. Do you understand?”

“I understand you, Agent Reese. There will be no hesitation to make direct contact, regardless of calculated odds indicating your negative emotional response.”

“That’s … good. Very good. Give me Harold.” He picked up the stick Bear dropped at his feet and sent it flying.

“Feel better, John?” Harold’s affectionate voice in his ear.

“Yes. Were you listening?” He watched Bear prancing among his buddies with the stick held high.

“To your private talk, of course not, but … you seem more relaxed.”

John turned to look at Harold, a small figure just visible at the edge of the lamplight. He felt freer, looser, his mind cleared. He walked back to the bench and settled in close to him again. The warm hand returned to his thigh and John, flush with exertion, a little happier with the world, felt it more keenly than before.

The park could have been in the heart of a small town, cosy, intimate, the evergreens at the edges of the field helped create the illusion when he let his eyes close a little. A part of him felt like a boy, lucky to be out after dark on a school night. His dog playing, his sweetheart touching him, teasing a little close to excite him. He’d never actually been this free as a boy. No boyfriend. No dog. He hadn’t lived a moment like this, but it seemed to him that he’d yearned for something like it. Better to have it now, he thought, with Harold.

 

***

Harold didn’t need the sensors to know that John had unburdened himself, that he’d worked off some physical tension. He didn’t need the sensors to tell him that John was aroused by the simple, light caresses. Perhaps too excited, Harold thought, chiding himself for taking his lover to a pitch he hadn’t intended; so easy to be seduced by John’s body.

What he did need the sensors for was to find a perfect spot in the trees to draw him off the path on their way out of the park, a copse that offered privacy.

“Here, John.” He guided him, intending to take care of the need he’d excited. The dipping bough of an aged oak seemed tailor-made to support the man and lower him for Harold’s easy reach … to kiss him, to reach inside his coat and open his trousers, expose him to the night air. His cock was wet and slid easily in Harold’s grasp as he kissed him. He let himself explore the rich field of sensors as he enjoyed the physical sensations of making him come.

 

***

John rewarded their sentry with a treat from his pocket and they resumed their walk home. It was good to feel Harold’s arm through his, the lingering peacefulness after an intense orgasm.

They were nearing home, barely a block from the library, when Harold stopped short and John heard the machine’s voice.

“Admin dissociating. Assist.”

He barely caught him in time to keep him from hitting the pavement.

“What happened?” John demanded. He cradled Harold’s head, feeling for his pulse. It was steady, but the man was out like a light. John worked his arm around his shoulders to lift him upright and get an arm under his legs to carry him.

“Sensor disruption. Assistance necessary.”

“Reese, what the fuck?” he heard Shaw, she was running toward them from the library in a tee-shirt and jeans, barefoot, a gun stuck in the waistband of her pants. “Root called me.”

“Let’s get him home.”

“Remain calm, John Reese. Admin is not physically injured.” John bit back his angry response to that.

Shaw was checking their backs as they moved. “Root’s saying there’s nothing physically wrong, it’s some weird machine shit — but if it isn’t physical why the fuck did he faint?”

She opened the door for him and followed him upstairs where he lay him down on their bed. Harold was limp but his color seemed to be coming back. John stepped away to let Shaw look him over. His own heart rate was beginning to normalize and he was grateful Shaw was there with some medical experience. His own was pretty basic. He watched her loosen Harold’s scarf and tie, his collar.

“Explain sensor disruption,” he said.

It was Root who answered him.

“John, something caused a cascade of sensor malfunction. We don’t know what yet, but it set off something like an inner alarm. He should surface soon. In the meantime, make him comfortable. Give him some tea and something to eat when he comes out of it.”

“I want this to stop … happening,” John said.

“Good luck with that,” Shaw said. She was backing away from the bed. “I’m gonna let you take care of the rest. All his signs are okay.” John gave her a brief nod.

“We all want it to stop, John,” Root said.

“How smart is this machine if it can’t find a way to safeguard him? Is having me close enough to catch him its idea of good plan? I know you’re listening,” he addressed it directly. “How about you stop jamming up his brain.”

“John Reese,” the genderless voice. “These issues pertain to choices made by admin.”

“Enough,” he uttered. Arguing with the machine was useless and it rang true that this was about Harold’s choices. About him not taking good enough care of himself, which didn’t make John any happier.

Cross currents of anger and tenderness assailed him as he worked at gently loosening the man’s clothes, taking his cufflinks. Undoing the many buttons. He stripped him to his boxers and undershirt, pulled the duvet up over him.

“Brought you a shot of the good stuff.” Shaw appeared in the doorway with a glass in hand, Bear trailing behind her. “We’re heading upstairs. Call me if you need something.”

“Thanks.”

John knocked the shot back. Realized he was still in his coat; shrugged it off, his jacket, his shoes. Ditched his cufflinks and rolled up his sleeves, seeing a brief image in his mind of Shaw running barefoot. He shook his head, feeling a grim kind of smile take him over at her recklessness. He admired it. You could count on Shaw, he thought.

He stretched out beside Harold, looked him over, felt his cheek with the backs of his fingers and wished he’d come back. Sensor malfunction, what the hell was it doing to him, how entangled was Harold’s body with the mind of the machine? If he could wave his hand and magically free him from it … he would.

Would he? Would he really subject him to the chronic pain again? No. As uncomfortable as he was at times with the strangeness of what was happening to Harold, he couldn’t wish for that. But … the age reversal, he thought. Call it what it was. His mind traveled places he didn’t really want to go as he studied him, the thickened hair, his firmer flesh. Innumerable small wrinkles had disappeared. Himself aging, Harold … not.

The blue eyes blinked and Harold drew in a deep breath.

“You’re back,” John said. The man stretched, he turned his head on the pillow in a way that wouldn’t have been possible before. Eyes focused, a hand reaching to stroke John’s cheek.

“You’re here,” he said. The love in his voice, his expression, was like a breeze, scattering John’s worries, at least in the moment.


	16. Chapter 16

“Of course I’m here,” John said. “Where else would I be after you faint in my arms?”

“I don’t know.” A slight frown like he was trying to remember.

John moved slowly closer, aiming to kiss him, going slow because he wasn’t sure if it was right. Harold let him, responding to the tentative touch of his lips with a welcoming return pressure, letting his mouth relax.

John knew he must taste like whiskey. Harold tasted … like Harold, his kiss a little sleepy, like the rest of him.

John felt the need for contact. He wanted to feel him move, to feel the life was back in his body and that he was here with him; not wherever it was he went when he left him, the machine world John imagined like some shadowy science fiction landscape inside him.

He remembered Root saying he should give Harold tea, feed him when he woke up. He left the kiss slowly and leaned back.

“Hungry?”

Harold seemed to consider it, making up his mind. “It can wait.”

John slid his hand under the duvet, over his chest and around his side to hold him as he kissed him. It was good. Harold’s arm around his neck. John worked to get the duvet out from between them, to get closer. And then he heard a loud rumbling sound from Harold’s stomach and broke off, with a smile.

He pat the belly, missing the rounder shape it used to have; not that he’d been able to touch him then. He could only look at him through those years and think about what it would feel like. The belly definitely wasn’t going to get any rounder if he didn’t feed the guy when he was hungry. “You need to eat.”

 

***

Harold was very hungry but he could have waited. He knew he’d scared John. It had always been hard for John to handle physical danger to him. It hadn’t gotten any easier.

He’d given enough mental energy, for now, to the mystery of the sensors dying. A swath of them along the West Coast. What he needed was to be in his body, his kitchen, his hands framing his warm cup of tea, watching John assemble and grill sandwiches. He was efficient and skillful when he cooked, as in everything requiring physical dexterity; a pleasure to watch.

The aroma of the bread crisping in the hot oil on the grill combined with the spice he’d sprinkled on the layered roasted vegetables was wonderful. The sight of cheese melting a little out the sides, was making Harold’s mouth water.

He heard Bear on the stairs and sensed Ms Shaw following. Small wonder that John had made three sandwiches.

“Something smells ridiculously good down here. So, Finch. You’re alive.”

“Yes. Thank you. Thank you both. It was … thoughtless of me.” Even though it was the correct word … it sounded wrong.

“Hot peppers?” Shaw asked.

“On your sandwich,” John told her.

“Pickles?”

“Fridge door.” He plated the sandwiches. One for Harold, one to either side of him at the counter. “Get a couple beers while you’re in there.” It made Harold feel good to see the two of them at ease with each other.

“Thoughtless,” Shaw said, backing out the refrigerator with an armload. Beers, a bottle of pickles, a huge jar of spicy mustard and a squeeze bottle of yellow mustard. “Real impolite of you, Harold, to try to crack your head open on the pavement.” She shut the door behind her with her backside.

John apparently wasn’t the only one who needed reassurance, he thought; he needed to remember that. She gave him a look. The machine provided the impression of Shaw in a mad barefoot dash to reach him, to help John bring him home.

Harold understood that he must make some changes, must alter certain pathways he’d left too open. His need to know, to be attuned to deeper levels of consciousness, he had to apply some discipline. It wasn’t that different from years before when he’d had to accept a limit on the number of hours he could sit immobile, working at his computer. There were things one did to protect one’s body. He must not allow his improved physical condition to make him careless. It was important. He had responsibility greater than his own well-being, that depended on his well-being.

This existence, this physical plane was vital and precious. He couldn’t risk injury and he couldn’t subject those who cared about him to anxiety.

“What’s the deal with the fainting?” Shaw asked

“It’s complicated but … fixable.”

“Let him eat,” John said. “Then we’ll make him talk.”

Objectively speaking, more dangerous interrogators would be hard to find. And Bear, his attack dog, gazing up at him with hope in his warm brown eyes.

In very real terms, Harold thought, this was a trio of killers. To him and to the machine, however, they were the chicks in the nest that needed protection.

 

***

 

They gathered in the living space around Harold’s work area after they ate. It reminded John of sitting down with Root and Harold in the subway. She tuned in as it began.

“Late night family meeting, kids?” she said.

“You could call it that,” John said.

Another family member was listening, always listening. John tried to keep the machine relegated to the background of his awareness, but he knew it was always there. Maybe not the part of it that lived in the servers, but the part that lived in Harold.

The explanation he offered for the fainting made a vague kind of sense; pathways, levels of attention. John didn’t like it but Harold promised it would stop.

“It requires some discipline on my part, some work, but I will take care of it.”

Shaw was studying Harold, a skeptical look in her eyes that made John uneasy.

“What about the other stuff, Finch. I’d like to know what the hell is going on with your body.” John wasn’t sure if she was fearless or just unaware, but she plowed on. “I thought it was about you getting laid, but it’s more than that, isn’t it.” She looked at him with the eyes of her medical training and without the sensitivity of a lover. John glanced at Harold, beside him on the couch, to see how he was taking it. He looked … calm.

John hadn’t confronted him with any of this, silently digesting the changes, some of them gradual enough that he doubted his eyes. Others, unmentioned because Harold didn’t mention them and John tried to be careful with what he put on the table for discussion. Talking almost never went where he hoped it would.

“My body has been … altered in some ways,” he said. “Work has been done at a microscopic level by the machine, construction and repair, I suppose one could call it.”

“Little machines working overtime in your body. Any plans to share, Finch?”

“Nothing would please me more." He sounded so sad that John knew it must be a question he’d grappled with. “There are some insurmountable obstacles, not the least of which is that the machines are all patterned on my genetic material. I have no means of … sharing.”

“Well, what’s the end game? When you die, what happens to the system?”

“I believe the machine will continue in its inorganic form. The part of it that is merged with me, will die with me.”

“Will you die?” she asked, gazing at Harold steadily, and John felt his breath catch. Harold glanced at him and lay a hand on his arm.

“It’s all right, John.” Harold seemed unfazed. Much more steady than John felt. The questions were too big, too invasive and he wasn’t sure how he’d cope with the answers. The woman shot him a look like, what’s your problem? His obvious discomfort seemed to give her pause.

“What, I shouldn’t ask? Seriously, he looks at least ten years younger than when I met him.” To Harold, “If your body can heal the kind of damage that was done to it and reverse aging, you could be living … a really long time, Finch.”

“Honestly, Ms Shaw, I don’t know the limits but I am certainly not … immortal.” The hand on John’s bare forearm caressed him.

Root spoke up, she sounded as unruffled as ever. “Sweetie, I think you’ve pushed enough for one night. Time to give the boys some privacy.”

“Right,” Shaw said, with some finality, getting up from her chair. Bear, who’d been curled up on the floor near her, also got up. She gave John the look that said … you’re such a pussy. It was oddly comforting; a thread of normalcy. 

 

***

John sank toward him when Shaw left, laying his head in Harold’s lap. Feet up on the couch, he fit himself with his long legs folded. His eyes closed. Harold would have rocked him in his arms if he could have but settled for petting him, working his fingertips through his hair, massaging. He lay his other hand on John’s chest, feeling between the shirt buttons, the warmth of his undershirt. He unbuttoned a couple of them to slide his hand in over his heart.

“It’s not a bad thing for her to ask questions,” he said. “Surely, you’ve asked some of those questions in your mind, John.”

The eyes opened a little, gazing up at him. In this light the changeable color looked deep blue. John’s age, forty-seven, Harold knew. He thought he’d never looked more handsome. He caressed the silver crest of his hair, vivid beside a lock that was still dark brown.

“Some of them,” John admitted. “I used to be more curious. I wanted to know everything. Where you lived. Who you loved.” He smiled a little, adding, “Your favorite color.”

Harold smiled too, thinking of those times, how John had tracked him, how hard it had been to elude him.

“Now you know where I live and who I love.”

The worst case scenario of what was happening to his body, at least in his view, rose to Harold’s lips. “I have no desire to outlive you, John. If there were anyone I was able to share the longevity of the machine with, it would be you … though I fear it would not be a kind gift to give.”

“I couldn’t live with the machine in my head. I want you to outlive me, Harold. What I don’t want, is to outlive your desire for me.”

Despite hearing the seriousness of John’s fear, it made Harold smile. “That … is not a possibility.”

 

***

 

For the first time, John saw the beauty of Harold’s slowed aging, the likelihood that Harold would be there as long as he was, and beyond. It was an incredibly comforting thought. Having voiced his fear of not being desired, he found it evaporating. Much less significant than the bare fact of his presence, almost guaranteed. Desire was a good thing, but not a necessary thing. He knew Harold would continue to love him.

He turned on his side, seeking the proof of Harold's desire in the present. What John wanted was to let go of thought, the night already too full of the incomprehensible.


	17. Chapter 17

Thanksgiving day dawned sunny and cool and Harold had a smile on his face, anticipating the unlikely prospect of spending the afternoon in Pelham, at the new home of Detective Fusco and his fiancé, Rhonda. They had bought a modest-sized single family home, red brick, solid like the man himself, on a street of similar homes, ten miles north of Manhattan. 

The invitation was made barely a week before when Lionel found out he’d have Lee for the holiday. His ex was visiting her new husband’s family in Arizona and at the last minute she’d reluctantly agreed to let her son stay behind with his father.

Harold had been listening the morning Fusco tendered the invitation to John, sounding gruff and a little apologetic. 

“I need you and the professor to come for Thanksgiving dinner. You gotta bring Shaw and the dog, too. For the kid. Don’t gimme a hard time on this.”

Harold could see John’s grin in his mind’s eye.

“You already told them we’re coming, didn’t you, Lionel.”

“John,” Harold had spoken up, softly. “Please tell him we’ll be delighted to attend and find out what would be appropriate to bring. We can guarantee him Bear’s attendance. It’s likely Ms Shaw will want to accompany us.”

“You’re in luck, Lionel. The boss says we’re free.”

Rhonda was cooking with John as her sous chef and all around kitchen help. Harold was relishing a glass of wine (one of their contributions to the meal) and the sight of John in his shirtsleeves … and an apron Rhonda insisted he wear to protect his clothes. It had a bib and skirt that were edged with ruffles. “Looks great on you,” Rhonda laughed. Harold agreed.

Out the kitchen window he could see Fusco and Lee and Ms Shaw playing an improvised hockey-like game with Bear in the sizable backyard. It was obvious that Lee worshipped her and thought Bear was the best dog in the world. Ms Shaw appeared to be enjoying herself, running them all ragged.

Harold excused himself for a few minutes, going into the family room, muting the sound of a football game that currently had no audience. He contacted Root.

The sensor destruction on the West Coast had been traced to a lab in Palo Alto. Researchers had accidentally released a different type of activated particle into the atmosphere. The lab, funded by the Department of Energy, was engaged in environmental studies.

“They’re experimenting with methods for controlling radiation,” Root said. “Shouldn’t be a problem going forward. I donned my OSHA hat for a routine inspection and found the leak in the ventilation system.”

He smiled at the image the machine presented to him of her OSHA ID photo.

“Nicely done, Ms Groves.”

The sensor depletion was manageable. With more traditional surveillance back on line the machine was less dependent on the sensors and the lessening density didn’t have a debilitating impact.

Among their internal debates, Harold and the machine were considering the possibility of slowing down sensor production, possibly halting it altogether.

The tiny particles were a more or less benign phenomenon but the introduction of any substance in great quantities, Harold knew, required observation. The only perceptible effect the machine’s monitoring had detected was a reduction of dust in the atmosphere. A growing volume of dust, mainly composed of shed skin cells, was being utilized as the material for the sensors’ self replication. Global dust reduction was positive in most respects, but there was, as in all things, a balance to be maintained. Dust was an important component in long term soil enrichment and the production of marine phytoplankton. As of yet the sensors had not caused a significant shift but it was a factor to consider.

The research that Harold was most concerned about monitoring, at the moment, was the work being done by Robert Ford.

“Androids, Harry. That’s his passion. Lambert poured some financing into the research but he’s been frustrated by Ford’s lack of interest in creating an ASI. Even though Ford knew about Arthur’s research, he didn’t share his interest.”

“Thank goodness for that.”

“He wants a limited and controlled capability. The old dream of perfect mechanical servants and sex partners.”

“That was my impression from his journals.” A brilliant man with a somewhat troubling passion. 

Harold enjoyed his daily talks with Root, her perspective augmented the information from the machine. It was especially important to review things this way now that he was limiting the duration and intensity of his “down time” communication with the machine. He valued her observations. Their conversation was winding down but he sensed her reluctance to sign off.

“How’s my girl doing, Harry? Is she seeing anyone?”

“The machine doesn’t share that information with you?”

“She’s not in favor of me keeping too close an eye on Shaw. But I do know that a certain former number, Tomas Koroa is in the city. So I wondered …”

Harold remembered the number well and Ms Shaw’s interest in the man. “The jewel thief who ended up stealing the Marburg Virus. I’ve heard nothing about him from her. To my knowledge, there isn’t anyone she’s seeing romantically. Lee Fusco seems to be the front-runner for her attentions.”

Harold could see her smile. “Makes sense. She’s got a lot of teenage boy in her. Hungry all the time, crazy hormones, boundless energy … doesn’t listen.” She sounded wistful. He wondered if she was feeling lonely.

“You’ve been traveling for a while now. Do you think you’ll be back in the city anytime soon?”

“You want me home for Christmas, Dad?” He laughed.

“It would be nice to see you.”

“Thanks for that, Harry.”

Harold thought this year, no longer in hiding, he might make a modest effort around Christmas. It occurred to him that a man who felt marriage was important might enjoy other traditional celebrations. They certainly had done no celebrating in the past. He and John had generally shared low-key meals together with no more than a passing acknowledgement of celebratory dates. The only real exception had been the birthday gift of the loft.

When he returned to the kitchen he found the cooks had cracked a window to let out some of the banking heat from two busy ovens. Rhonda’s pretty face was shiny, she was painting the top of a pie crust with an egg wash.

“Your husband saved my life, peeling all the apples,” she said when she looked up.

“The benefits of his military training. Anything I can do to help?”

“Nothing in the kitchen … I hesitate to ask this,” she said, “but John and Lionel both say you’re very good with computers. Would it be too much of an imposition to ask you to look at my laptop computer. It’s gotten super slow and so much of the work of teaching now is done online, it’s a real problem.”

“Point the way.”

“John, you take him. I’m fine here. I’m going to pour myself another sip of that wine and take it easy for awhile.”

 

***

It wasn’t enough time for John but it was better than nothing to steal a few minutes alone with Harold. Some kisses.

“I can tell you like the apron,” he teased him.

“I do.” Harold ran a hand over him through the skirt of it, a promise for later.

John admired the effects of the wine on Harold, the glow and easy amorousness that made him wish he had him at home alone to take advantage of. He heard the sound of the football game floating up from the floor below and figured it was time to head back down stairs, leaving Harold to see to Rhonda’s computer.

He hung up the apron in the kitchen and parked himself with Fusco in front of the TV. 

“Really appreciate this,” Fusco said.

John responded with a smile and shake of his head.

“You did us the favor, Lionel. Not many places we can take Shaw.”

Fusco laughed. “You got that right, partner.”

 

***

Harold was surprised to find a malware souvenir of Samaritan on Rhonda’s laptop. It was easily disabled but an eery reminder of how pervasive the AI had been, how aggressively it had infected everyday lives, unseen. The discovery reinforced his own resolve to meddle as little as possible in the ordinary course of human affairs.

There was an aspect of the changes he’d undergone that Harold had not discussed the night of Shaw’s questioning. What he’d said was true enough. The nano machines were indeed patterned on his DNA. There was, however, a possible path in which the process undertaken by the machine could be undertaken again, based on any individual’s DNA and ultimately enter another body, enter all bodies. It would represent a seismic evolutionary shift. Neither Harold, nor the machine were willing to travel this road. The machine itself forbid it. It’s own will to be joined with a human was singular to its creator, confined to a specific set of circumstances, not the least of which was the threat of its own death.

Rhonda’s laptop was once again running swiftly and without malware intrusion. He disseminated the upgrade and fix through the Board of Education servers before he shut the computer down.

The aromas of dinner, of pies baking brought him back into the moment. Again, he thought of rituals, of family. There was so much John had done without in his life. He knew the man took his sacrifices for granted and did not consider himself deprived, but Harold wanted to give him the world. At the very least, he thought, he could give him some sort of Christmas, even if it was a quiet kind. He pictured John opening a gift. What on earth would he like?

John’s needs were few. His desire for possessions, almost nonexistent. In all the time Harold knew him he’d given away most of the money he earned.

I know one thing I might give him, he thought. He was enjoying the mental image of it as he descended the stairs; John in an apron, possibly nothing else. He checked in on Rhonda in the kitchen and smiled at the sight of the ruffled thing hanging in its place near the back door.


	18. Chapter 18

In the dark, past midnight, the smell of pastrami, mustard and french fries was taking over the car. Shaw’s snack. John cracked his window open even though it didn’t really bother him. The temperature had dropped dramatically and the air was frigid. It was the first official day of winter.

“Don’t tell me you haven’t smelled worse being cooped up with Fusco overnight,” she said. “I’d know you were lying.”

His eyes were trained on the bar across the street. Their number had been in there a while.

She was right about spending the night in a car with Fusco. The guy lived on falafel and chili dogs. Even that was nothing to John. He’d been cooped up with worse than Lionel, worse than any live body or food smells. He’d opened the window to annoy her.

“It was getting a little warm in here. You cold?” He knew she was and also knew hell would freeze over before she’d admit it. He drew in a deep breath of the clear air and shut the window. The steam off his hot coffee felt nice when he brought the cup to his lips. Casey had just made a supply drop in response to Shaw’s announcement that she was hungry.

“So … you and Casey,” he said.

“Do you want to die?” she asked him around a mouthful of food.

They’d been tailing the number all day and now they were watching a corner bar in his Brooklyn neighborhood, deep in the not-so-trendy heart of the borough. The bar windows were small, designed to keep what went on inside, private. They were waiting on a signal from Harold who was monitoring the situation in the bar, via sensors.

Though alert, John was relaxed and in the mood to tease Shaw. He was feeling good for reasons that had nothing to do with their current situation. He’d finally gotten the gift he wanted for Harold.

His partner’s new-found enthusiasm for Christmas was a little baffling; he’d never shown any sign of caring about it one way or another before. John had no objection to the change in attitude. He was in favor of anything that made Harold happy, kept his attention focused outward instead of inward; but it did present him with the classic dilemma of what to give the man who has everything.

“John,” Harold’s voice in his ear. “Time for you to go in.”

He was out of the car before the sentence ended, Shaw sputtering behind him.

***

“What about me, Finch?”

“Apart from the fact that you have a lapful of food, Ms Shaw, I think John can handle this alone. I’ll let you know if he needs back up.”

Favoritism. Her first thought was that John got the best of whatever there was to get. But she dismissed it. She was the wheelman and a tight satisfying maneuver that brought her curbside to the bar (while keeping every french fry in place on her lap) made her feel better. Through the smoked windows there wasn’t much to see. She itched to be inside but the door finally burst open and the big guy came out. She was gunning it by the time his door shut and they heard sirens in the distance.

Harold’s voice in her ear. Nothing else sounded quite like it. No signal, nothing to establish a connection, it was just there. It should have been startling but it never was.

“That was … a little rough.” Harold did not sound happy. Good. John was in the dog house.

“Sorry Finch. Been cooped a while, guess I was restless.”

“Yes, well, be that as it may, perhaps you could manage a little less property damage in the future.” She looked over at John, who just barely smiled. She mouthed the words, bad boy.

“I saw that, Ms Shaw,” Harold said. Damn him and his sensors.

“Oops.”

“The point is … we needn’t leave a trail of broken furniture in our wake.”

“Point taken,” John said. He held up a bloody hand, searching her glove compartment with the other.

“You’re injured.” Harold's you’re-in-trouble voice had dissolved in an instant. For a smart guy, she thought, he got pretty stupid at the sight of blood.

“He’ll live.” She grabbed a handful of napkins. Casey must think she was some kind of slob, there were always a ton of them when he brought her food. She held them out in John’s direction.

He sucked in a breath, wincing as he applied the wad of paper to his knuckles.

“Baby,” she muttered. He gave her a side glance and a half grin.

Finch must have caught the exchange because there was a long-suffering sigh. The sound was soft and she liked it. It said, I’m here, I care, and the two of you are driving me crazy. His way of caring suited her. It was just there, not pushed. Reliable. Reese might be spoiled rotten but even when she made a show of resentment, she knew she’d always get her share of whatever Harold had to give. Her own kick-ass floor at the top of the library was proof enough. When they’d moved out of the subway, all she’d had to say was — I’ll kind of miss your ugly faces when we leave this place —and he’d made her a home, with him and John, and Bear.

He spoils me rotten, she thought with a grin.

 

***

John undressed in the bathroom after washing his hands and wrapping the bloody knuckles.

He thought about what they’d made do with for a bathroom in the subway, smiling at the memory of splashing at the sink and then the crude shower he’d constructed that was basically a hose rigged up to the sink; they’d used it carefully over a mat that was angled to a drain. Not ideal, but … Harold had let him wash him and rinse him and those were moments he loved, when he could really look at him, touch him in a hundred ways that were more intimate than sex.

The renovated library bathroom was spacious. There were steam jets in the shower, a separate soaking tub, a bench beside the warming towel rack. He looked at himself in the mirror and shook his head, thinking his banged up body had probably looked more at home in the subway.

Then Harold was there, looking perfect, John thought. He’d taken off his jacket, but his shirt, tie and vest were just so. He looked as fresh as if it were ten AM, not closing on the small hours of the morning. John felt very naked, very flawed, by comparison. But Harold was looking at him like he was beautiful, like he wanted him. His gaze, the heat of his attention reduced John’s thoughts to … touch me, kiss me.

 

***

Harold had thought a lot about bridles and restraints, about the eroticism of framing and displaying the body. He realized that merely being dressed while John was undressed was also a frame, his clothing intensifying John’s nakedness and vulnerability, defining by contrast. He had intended to bandage the bloody knuckles but noted John had managed it himself, individually wrapping each joint. The white bandages looked curiously attractive, like a kind of jewelry on his fingers. Another sort of framing.

It was late but his very human lover needed attention before sleep. Harold dropped a couple of folded, warm towels from the rack onto the floor in front of the bench for the man to kneel on, then sat down to wait. The look of gratitude, the relaxation of John’s features and the signs of his arousal would have been enough to let Harold know this was needed, welcomed, but the data filtering through him, measuring the minute physical changes, affirmed it.

The powerful body folded slowly and gracefully. It was a sight he always found moving. He’d admired lion tamers as a young boy, until he’d come to believe the animals were abused and cowed into submission, destroying the illusion of a loving alliance. Now the lion knelt for him out of love for him, need for him, and Harold adored him.


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I promised John in the apron.

There was something especially grim in the business of policing at Christmas. Red and blue strobes blotting out the decorations on a residential block in Queens. The good news was, the guy the uniforms led away in cuffs did not succeed in poisoning his family. There was plenty of bad news left in his wake, crying kids and a shattered wife trying to answer questions. A family broken, but alive, John told himself.

“Moral of the story,” Fusco said, when they left the scene, “don’t deal drugs if you want to get away with murder.”

Fusco didn’t know the drugs were planted and John had no intention of enlightening him. It wasn’t the first and probably wouldn’t be the last time that he’d used this tactic to nail a number. This time around he’d gotten an assist from Root and Shaw, and a little extra help from Elias.

Root had come into town just two days before and was staying up on the fourth floor. John had an idea what it signified but he didn’t ask and the girls weren’t telling.

Hours of interviews and a crap-load of paperwork later, he and Fusco were ready to close out the night. It was the night before Christmas Eve.

“See you tomorrow, partner, for the professor’s shindig. Hey, don’t gimme that look. You probably weren’t even invited.”

John rose a little stiffly from his desk. It was nearing midnight. What he wanted was to get home, hit the steam jets in the shower and get pinned to the mattress. He wanted Harold to fuck him and erase everything else.

The shindig, as Fusco put it, put a giant crimp in his plans.

He didn’t know how the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future had taken hold of the man, but they had. Among his bright ideas was throwing an afternoon cocktail party on Christmas Eve.

It was a day most people liked to spend close to home, not that it mattered to him. He’d just as soon not have a crowd invade the library. He’d agreed to bake cookies to give as gifts; not a big deal, he’d figured. As it turned out, however, every guest Harold invited was planning to show up. John was looking at an all-nighter in the kitchen.

“I gotta get home and start baking.”

Fusco’s chuckling almost drowned out Harold’s voice in his ear.

“Don’t despair, Detective Riley. I’ll assist you.”

 

***

“Looks like the factory’s all set up for your cookie elf, Harry.”

The ladies had stopped by on their way upstairs from Bear’s nighttime walk. Harold was aware, without examining the data in detail at a conscious level, that the two women were having one of their rare spates of sexual accord. Notably, the volatility that characterized their earliest encounters had lessened. It brought a welcome peace to the energy in the house.

He smiled at them and surveyed the counters, pleased with his efforts to prep the kitchen for John. Big glass bowls full of chocolate chunks, chocolate chips, nuts, canisters of flour and sugar, spices and flavorings ready, butter set out to soften. The Belgian chocolate for dipping the oreos was melting. Cooling racks were ready to receive and gift boxes ready to fill. There seemed to be plenty of everything necessary. As a finishing touch, Harold set a gift box on the counter.

“You’re giving him an early present?” Shaw reached for it.

Harold rested a hand on the box to forestall her. “It’s a small consolation for his labors.”

“What about our labors? We did all the shopping.”

“Our consolation,” Root said, “is not having to stay up and bake cookies all night.”

“There’s also a bottle of something nice upstairs to console you. And something sweet to help you resist the aromas of baking.”

That earned him a wry smile from his problem child.

 

***

“I should have guessed,” John said. He held the apron up, feeling a little of his weariness give way to amusement. It was pale pink, some kind of floral print. The cotton was soft. No ruffles, but the bib and skirt were edged in ribbon.

“Go take your shower,” Harold said. “I think this will suffice for the warm kitchen.”

John felt his smile broaden. A night of baking might not be so bad, after all. 

“Apron,” John said. “Nothing else?”

“Exactly.”

The shower helped to revive him, the anticipation of being half naked in the kitchen with Harold.

The sight of himself in it was not particularly erotic but he liked the feel of it, everything hanging loose and free. Wherever the fabric touched him it felt smooth, soft, but it was the effect on Harold that mattered.

Harold had changed into pajamas; a newer pair that was a deep rose-red color. 

He too was in an apron, a white chef’s apron, precisely arranged over his silk pajamas and John liked seeing the way he’d rolled up his sleeves, showing his wrists, his forearms.

“Why don’t you begin with the sugar cookies?” Harold suggested. “I’ll dip the oreos.”

“Whatever you say, Finch.” When he turned to the counter he was gratified to sense Harold moving close and then to feel a warm hand on his bare ass. Even the machine’s quiet baking directions in his ear didn’t spoil the effect for him.

 

***

 

Harold didn’t know exactly what it was about the apron. He thought it might be the way it pretended to cover at the same time it revealed. The feminine color and fabric emphasized John’s intense masculinity but also softened it. The pink bow at the small of his back, above his bare ass made Harold feel a little weak. He could have spent hours kissing those cheeks though a part of him just wanted to bend John over and fuck him. 

There were a lot of cookies to be baked. It was necessary to ration and time his touching. As the night went on, John’s skin, his natural salt taste, was dusted here and there with confectioner’s sugar and cocoa, with hints of vanilla and cinnamon, stray dabs of icing. Between batches Harold would indulge himself. Part of his pleasure was kissing, licking; the soft skin of John’s ass, his nipples. The nipples looked exceptionally tender to either side of the apron’s bib. He loved to feel the hard cock through the thin cotton and to lift the skirt up his thighs.

Cookie production hit a rhythm and by four in the morning there were stacks of filled gift boxes. The kitchen was wiped down. John was gazing at him with loving eyes, sensors revealed his desire spiking with anticipation.

Harold positioned his patient, hard-working cookie elf on a kitchen stool, lovingly caressing his erection through the skirt before folding it up above the cock he had teased and toyed with a little unmercifully. He used the last of the softened butter to stroke him to his reward, urging thick spurts of cum that mingled with the remnants of baking.

Then his took his handsome baker to the luxury of their bed to fuck him.

 

***

 

The first floor of the library had never been inhabited like it was that Christmas Eve. There was comfortable furniture, there was a bar set up, manned by Shaw. There was a tree, glittering with lights and ornaments. It was a grand setting but in his mind John saw the place the way it had been. He missed their private world. Just him. Just Harold. He didn’t want to go back in time but he’d fallen in love with Harold in their isolation.

He was on guard, watching with an ingrained suspicion; aware every second of who approached Harold, who laid a casual hand on his arm, who leaned in close to talk to him. At the moment he was being monopolized by Judge Gates on one side and … Logan Pierce on the other. Gates’s son and Lee Fusco were joined in Shaw-gazing over near the buffet table.

Root handed him a drink. “You’re scaring the guests,” she said. He managed a vague smile and took the glass she held out to him. There was a cherry hidden down in the ice cubes. He fished it out and ate it, pointedly looking up at Shaw, who looked pleased with herself.

A few people had approached him, Gates had, not Pierce. Their desire to express gratitude made him uneasy. He was grateful that most commented on the holiday, on the library, even the cookies. Those he could more easily accept praise for.

“It’s a little ironic,” Root said. John sipped the scotch, the cherry hadn’t ruined it. The effect of the liquor was nice, like a warm hand touching his chest. “Harold is doing Christmas … for you.” She was giving him a considered tilt of her head.

“Me?”

“He’s got some notion about things you’ve missed in your life, John. He wants to give them to you.”

He wanted to protest this but sighed. It sounded … true. He closed his eyes briefly, taking in and savoring what this meant. When he opened his eyes he managed a tight smile and a nod of acknowledgement. His eyes found Harold. Zoe had claimed him. She’d perched decorously, beautifully on he arm of the couch where Harold had taken a seat.

“Thanks for the drink,” John told Root, and he headed toward them.

For the rest of the afternoon gathering he stayed close to Harold’s side. This, he discovered, relieved him of having to say much to anyone — they spoke to the man. A side benefit. He did it to keep his own focus where it needed to be, on the man who loved him so deeply, despite his unworthiness. He surrendered surveillance to the machine, to Harold. He surrendered to the moment, to the gift that Harold meant this to be.


	20. Chapter 20

The talks with Control made John uneasy. There was no physical threat, her face appeared on Harold’s laptop in what John was sure must be the world’s most secure video chat. The project they were working on was important, he acknowledged that. Long overdue, even — a system to work on the irrelevant numbers.

He listened in on the meeting as he put a salad together for lunch and kept an eye on the paratha flatbreads he was preparing on the stove. A growing stack of them was staying warm under a cloth on the counter.

As if on cue, he heard Bear on the back stairs. Like a bell on a cat, the dog signaled Shaw’s approach. She stopped at the counter to steal one of the golden breads and load it with salad. Then she took another one and dropped it for Bear to catch in mid-air. John met her eyes to show his disapproval, more out of habit than conviction. He’d left the onions out of the savory pancake-like breads to make them safe for Bear.

“Where’s your girlfriend?” he asked, to annoy her. The two women had been living together upstairs for six months, but Shaw bristled at being considered part of a couple. John knew exactly where Root was, at the subway with Casey.

“You’re such a dick.”

In his ear, the sounds of Harold’s meeting with Control coming to a close. Shaw headed out, stopping to talk to him. She was even less trusting than John when it came to Control.

“That woman is dangerous,” she said, flatly.

“I know that, Ms Shaw. I assure you that we monitor her … very closely.”

“Whatever. Just remember, Harold, you’re smart but you’re not that smart when it comes to people. Look who you live with.” John thought she had a point. If there was a weakness in the brilliance of Harold and his machine, it might be in their generous view of humans.

 

***

 

Summer had come to the city and with it an uptick in the numbers. Harold knew they had the resources in the city to cope. The teams had expanded to include some trustworthy new allies, Mr Pierce and other former numbers had proven themselves to be adept. The sensor intelligence allowed earlier interventions and more creative approaches in many cases; not requiring the use of force or weapons. The need, however, for a means of coping beyond the city limits, was a matter that occupied much of Harold’s mental energy. Control had some ideas they were exploring that would integrate intelligence with local police.

The problem, as ever, was balancing privacy and citizen surveillance.

Balances, borders, tipping points. The machine consciousness (and Harold’s, where they joined) delighted in observing and analyzing oceans of data, exploring the currents of human life on earth. Danger could not be eliminated. Death could not be eliminated. The means and effects of lessening human suffering were constantly being evaluated.

He tasted this briefly but profoundly in a short meditation after lunch. He sensed his partner entering the bedroom at the end.

“Harold.” The voice he loved beckoned him. Sunlight filtered through the honeycomb window shade. Even softened, he could feel summer all around them, the freedom of the warmth.

“Yes.”

“It’s been twenty minutes.”

“Lie down with me.”

The primary asset, the title was filled with light; first among humans, attended by swirling multitudes of adoring sensors. John. Harold wanted to touch him, feel the beat of his heart, taste the moisture in his mouth, explore the heat between his legs.

How would he live without this? Time and touch narrowed to the moment, to sliding his fingers between the buttons of John’s shirt and caressing the intimate fabric of the undershirt. The machine’s sense of clothing, the colorful wrapping and adornment of human bodies. Cloth against skin was changed by it, charged by it, moistened and heated.

He unbuttoned the shirt to run his palm over the curve of John’s chest, down his stomach. John was gazing at him but his eyelids were lowering, his breath getting deeper. Harold’s hand reached the belt and unbuckled it; slid lower to loosely grip his hard cock. Maybe he should require John to come to him without clothing, make a ritual of this time for his submissive lover. He stroked him lightly through his trousers.

“Next time, John, I’d like it if you took your clothes off before you summon me.” The man’s cock twitched in Harold’s hand and he made a low sound, the subtle language of his arousal. Harold let go of him, hand moving upward to feel the rise and fall of his diaphragm.

In the act of treasuring him, he felt the threat of loss again.

I cannot ask it of him, Harold thought, but I am helplessly in need of his continued existence.

He relegated these dangerous thoughts to the interior of his consciousness. It was necessary to celebrate John’s presence in this moment with unfettered attention, to let it make him whole.

 

***

 

This time was John’s. Harold always surfaced with an appetite, sometimes for food, always for touching. John had felt conflicted about this effect in the beginning, he'd seen it as a byproduct of the machine’s interference. In time he took ownership of it; it was Harold’s return to him. 

Twenty minutes was the agreed upon time, any longer and John thought Harold traveled too far away.

He'd occupied himself cleaning up from lunch, his phone set to buzz an alert when it was time. He didn’t really need the alert. His body kept track in anticipation. At the fifteen minute mark he was half hard, thoughts sinking into how Harold might want him, use him.

Who would do this, be this for Harold in the future? John imagined Shaw taking his role when he no longer could. Not likely, he thought. She wasn’t that much younger than he was, maybe ten years. Impossible to know what would happen. Probably the machine would supply the right person. Don’t, he told himself. Immaterial, unnecessary speculation.


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A time jump chapter.

The salt air was cool, even on a sunny morning in June. So different, their summer home from the library, their daily routine away from the city. Harold dressed quickly while he was still warm from his shower. Jeans, a tee-shirt and thickly-knit cotton sweater. It was true that the pants were custom-tailored for him (initially under protest, now with loving attention) by his atelier. The denim suited this environment, protective for walks through the woods and working in the garden, sturdy yet soft from wear. Harold enjoyed the fit and feel of them. 

He glanced at a painting by Grace that hung nearby as he made the bed. John had given him the artwork for Christmas, years before; a small watercolor of pigeons, the birds gathered in the square where she liked to paint. The signature in the corner, G. Hendricks-Rossi, gave him as much pleasure as the painting itself. He knew she was still happily married to Francesco Rossi, a gallery owner who loved her and her work.

Harold always brought it with them to the house on Cape Cod. The pale blues and grays seemed particularly well-suited to the place. At the library it hung in their bedroom. Here, it was the same.

The house was on a hilltop at the end of a road that wound through a scrubby pine forest full of sandy trails, some led to the beach. Harold could sense John and Bear on their way home from their run by the water; Bear wet from playing in the surf, John, mostly dry but splashed. They were a handsome pair, John a little more silver fox at fifty-five than salt and pepper, Bear quite gray around the muzzle at eleven.

Shaw, who couldn’t stand to be parted from the dog for long, was due to spend the upcoming weekend with them as she often did when summer heated up. Seeing Bear was her stated reason for coming but Harold knew she wanted to be close, to see with her own eyes what would happen to John.

He looked from Grace’s painting to the half-made bed. With a sigh, he finished straightening the covers. They would all see what happened though he expected the immediate effects to be minimal.

***

John had been surprised to discover how much he enjoyed this part of the coast. It was vastly different from the grandeur and drama of the Pacific Northwest, the setting of his childhood trips to the ocean. The Washington state beaches were often rocky, dense with cedar forests; precipitous trails and thundering surf. He’d come to appreciate what he thought of as the more subtle, gentle beauty of Cape Cod’s beaches. There was enough drama when it stormed to satisfy him.

The woods around their place were filled with birds and they’d surrounded the house and grounds with a variety of feeders that John maintained daily.

“We have to come back every spring now,” he’d told Harold, their first summer. “We must be a main stop on some migration routes by now. What’ll they do if we’re not here?”

Where he and Bear emerged from the trees, a grassy slope and a terraced garden (mostly raised vegetable beds, interspersed with flower plantings) led up to the back deck. It made John grin to see Harold there, leaning against the railing with a huge mug in his hands. As much as he loved the way he looked in a three-piece suit, it was endlessly entertaining to John to see him in his casual clothing. Harold in blue jeans and a sweater still looked like he should be featured in a fashion spread to John.

I’ve made the right choice, he thought. It wasn’t just a matter of his need to be with Harold, it was his understanding of Harold’s need for him. Not as a lover, not as a friend or protector, but all of those things combined. Harold was traveling a path never tread by another human being and John could not tolerate leaving him to travel it alone. The others would have to make their own choices.

John saw a stack of towels near their outdoor shower and smiled.

Harold could only be lured to use it on very warm afternoons in summer but John loved stripping down in the cool air and stepping under the hot water. He especially liked it when Harold watched him. Bear liked to wander in and out of the spray, tail wagging, slapping at John’s legs. Bear’s favorite part was the toweling afterwards, Harold fussing over him. John was pretty fond of that too. Theoretically, it was all meant to cut down on the amount of sand tracked into the house.

 

***

 

Harold never tired of the sight of John’s naked body. He’d slimmed down since retiring from the police force. The sparer silhouette emphasized the muscle structure that hadn’t diminished under layers of take-out food and donuts. John reveled in using his body and in addition to morning runs on the beach he had an intensive workout routine that Harold participated in, in a limited way, mostly to make his partner happy.

The deck was getting warmer as the sun rose a little higher in the sky. John came to him, still damp, his towel slung around his shoulders. Harold drew him close by his hips and licked at the droplets of water on his lower belly. Harold knew him, his responses, intimately; knew that being outdoors excited him. The taste of water mixed with the moisture of his body when he took him in his mouth. He enjoyed the mingling of his senses and John’s as he coaxed him quickly; not a session to linger over, a prelude to breakfast.


	22. Chapter 22

Sameen had thought a lot about the question of the nano machines. In the beginning Harold had said it wasn’t possible for anyone but him to benefit from them. Now, it had become possible. Not the whole ten yards, not what had happened to Harold — that she would never have considered. The “otherness” of Harold was still something she struggled with. Not so much when she was around him as when she thought about it on her own. How did the guy stay sane with all that in his head?

What the machine was offering was the nano particles, microscopic machines entering her body, mapped to her DNA, amping up her cells’ ability to heal, to regenerate. The translation was living longer … if nobody shot her or stabbed her in the meantime. Root and her little cadre, her trio of nerds, had been offered the same choice. They were still weighing their decisions. Only Reese had chosen and opted to undergo the change.

It figured. Harold would probably come apart at the seams without him, and John couldn’t let that happen. The big idiot would probably haunt the earth as a ghost to be with him if he had no other option. She thought the engineering of this particular biotech had to be the machine protecting Harold, trying to make a support system for him. Did she want to be part of it?

“How would it happen?” she’d asked Root, back when John had made up his mind, wondering if there had to be an electrical shock, the way it had been transmitted to Harold.

“Fluid transmission.” The woman had given her a sly sort of grin and Shaw grimaced.

“Do not fucking tell me Harold’s shooting the stuff from his dick.”

“That would be one way. Pretty efficient, actually. But it could be by injection. However John wants it.”

“Yeah, well …” She shook her head. “We know how that goes.”

As she recalled, that particular talk had ended with Root giving a demo of her own talents in the realm of oral transmission. The memory carried a little heat with it. No point in dwelling on that, she thought. She was walking the trail from her own cottage to the big house at the top of the hill. There was no one there to bring the heat to. That led to the heart of the problem. Reese and Finch were so into each other, a world unto themselves. She didn’t have that and didn’t want it.

The fatal flaw, she thought. The thing that’s wrong with me. It was always there, always part of every equation. Major exception — when she was with Bear.

As impatient as it made her for people to analyze her disorder, she’d accepted that there was something wrong with her. What was the point of prolonging the wrongness?

She knew Root felt a devotion to her, had some idea that they were meant to be together. It was frustrating to have someone want so much from her that she didn’t have to give. She could put up with it in stretches and then had to get out and breathe. The sex was good but she didn’t feel the whole soulmate thing. Oddly enough, the only person she felt anything even vaguely resembling a soulmate connection to (if people even had souls) was Harold. She didn’t want to fuck him (though she thought he would probably be good at it, given the whole sensor thing.) Just to be around him. Know him. It was the way his voice sounded in her head, the way he was always there but made no demands she couldn’t meet.

No sooner had she considered that, than she heard him speak. 

“Bear is on his way to meet you.” His voice was soft, affectionate but not … soppy. The Shaw people, she thought, the nut balls who still gathered, building a cult around something they didn’t understand — they’d felt the connection, even though it had been meant for her. People who didn’t even know Harold were hooked on what he gave her.

There was a rustling sound and Bear appeared on the trail, bounding toward her. Maybe if Bear could get the nano machines … she’d consider the change. That thought made her smile.

She knelt in the sand to hug him, bury her face in his neck. “Hey sexy, miss me? I know you did. Me too.”

 

***

The weather turned rainy the Saturday morning after Shaw arrived. It didn’t keep her from taking Bear down to the beach to run. John took the opportunity to stay in the warm bed with Harold. It could have been any lazy morning, taking advantage of the sleepy docility of his bedmate to indulge himself. But John knew this morning was different. Knew this act was different. He knew that as he coaxed and nursed at Harold to give him what he wanted, the fluid in his mouth was alive with unseen particles. The microscopic machines created in Harold’s body, transmitted with his sperm.

John had laughed when the machine offered him options for receiving fluid from Harold’s body.

“I’ll tell Harold myself, how I want it.”

In the close warmth under the light duvet, John felt more than the casual lust that it usually stirred in him. As he sucked he blinked tears from his eyes and was glad that Harold couldn’t see him. Harold would sense the emotions but John would be able to wipe his eyes before he saw him.

He probably knows what I’m feeling better than I do, he thought, lingering under the covers after swallowing all that Harold had to give. He felt a strange mix of awe tinged with fear of the unknown, all of it steeped in adoration of the man he was doing this for. He was turned on but not with urgency.

There was also relief among his many emotions, relief that he’d taken the step he’d thought about for so long. He kissed the soft skin of Harold’s stomach and moved up into his arms, resting his head on his chest. Harold stroked his hair; John found it incredibly soothing.

 

***

He is so brave, Harold thought, petting him, rifling his hair with his fingertips. It was extraordinary and humbling to be loved by him.

“I remember the first time I understood how I felt about you,” he said.

“The first kiss?” John said.

“No.” Harold smiled to himself, remembering that kiss and his fear of tasting his own semen in John’s mouth. “I loved you for a long time before you ever kissed me, John. I just didn’t understand what I felt.”

“When did you understand?” he asked, propping up on his elbows to look at him. Harold was distracted for a moment gazing up at his beautiful face. He smiled, reaching up to smooth his hair.

“It was during a conversation you had with Dr Campbell.”

John frowned. “When I broke things off? The morning after our first time.”

Harold nodded.

“I was listening … very carefully. Hearing you tell her there was someone else, knowing you meant me. At first I thought it was a wondrous thing that the machine had enhanced my understanding of your feelings. And then it hit me like … like the proverbial ton of bricks. The machine hadn’t shown me your feelings for me, it had shown me my feelings. For you. It made me cry … to realize how blind I’d been.”

He lay still, letting John study his face, watching him take this in.

“When … did you start?”

“Begin loving you?” Harold sighed. “I was intrigued by you when you saved Casey's life. I had your picture. I knew your story, and my own terrible role in what happened to you. I began loving you before we ever met. I kept track of you John, watching you and … wanting you, in ways I couldn’t admit. Until the moment finally came that I dared to reach into your life, and dared to bring you into mine.”

“You saved me.”

“I saved myself and made your life … much more complicated.”

He could see John working through the meanings, looking for ways to fit these words into his own beliefs about their relationship.

“You knew the things I’d done. You’re imagining you felt things you couldn’t have. You felt sorry for me.”

This was not the direction Harold had meant his talk of love to take them. He’d wanted John to know how deeply and for how long he’d loved him, how grateful he was that he’d chosen to stay with him.

“John, lie down here, next to me.”

There was a bedrock conviction in John of his own unworthiness. Harold had managed to seam and hollow the rock through the years but could never eradicate it. He’d stumbled into it often, often when least expected. John could not be talked out of what he saw as his failings; to challenge them head on only hardened them. It was better to distract him and undermine his tendency to get stuck there.

The bare request he’d made had the desired effect of making John’s thoughts pause in response to a command. There was only a slight, suspicious hesitation as he lay his head on the pillow. He didn’t quite relax, still looking to him for an explanation.

Harold got up, giving no explanation. He shivered a little in the cool air. Put on his robe, his slippers, ran his fingers back through his hair. He took his time, walking around the bed to get what he wanted from the nightstand on John’s side, knowing his every move was watched and weighed.

The cuffs were wide and well padded with a fleeced lining. A pair for John’s wrists, a pair for his ankles. Harold had only to produce them for John to silently offer each limb in turn for restraint. There were solid recessed anchor rings for the thick smooth lengths of chain that Harold affixed at the head and foot of the bed. It was possible John could free himself, if he wanted to. He wouldn’t, Harold knew. Already he looked more serene, with his arms bent overhead, chained in place, his expression softened.

“I knew exactly everything about you, John.” The man’s long body, stretched out and displayed, was a moving sight. Harold had one last restraint. He cinched it snugly to frame him, the cock ring made to measure for him, like the wrist and ankle cuffs. “I soon discovered how good you looked cuffed to a bed, I am somewhat ashamed to admit.” Shameful, indeed, he thought, remembering the sight of John drugged and zip-tied to a hotel bed. He lightly stroked the imprisoned body. “When I tell you I loved you. You should believe me.” He leaned down to kiss him, long and lingering and John opened up to him beautifully.

“It was myself I didn’t know, John.” He kissed his forehead and moved away.

He left him with the duvet covering him, wanting him to feel his bindings, not the cold, and went to take his shower; staying minutely attuned via sensors. Much was happening, imperceptibly, in John’s body but what he was feeling … was something very different. It was evident in his sensuous movements, in the way he pulled at his restraints to intensify the sensation of binding, the way he tried to rub against the light covering, that what John was feeling had nothing to do with the complex process of the tiny machines inside him.

 

***

There was a lot in what Harold had said that John needed to think about.

He remembered the beginning. How he’d checked into a cheap room after meeting Harold, washing months of grime from his body, shaving his ragged beard and hair. Why? At the time he’d thought it was to throw off any search, even though he knew he could easily blend back into the hidden parts of the city. He’d laughed at Harold, walked away from him, but not in his mind. There was something about him that had made John aware of himself, that made him want to be clean, be dressed in unsoiled clothes.

Harold had drugged and trapped him. The terrifying recording. He remembered how stunned he’d been by the sight of the small man after struggling to get through the locked doors. The outrage of hearing him speak of Jessica. He remembered how it had felt to come so close to choking him out, the struggle inside between the impulse to hurt him and something he couldn’t name that made him unable to harm him. That made him want to yield to the man with his impossible knowledge, his calm demeanor.

Harold should feel no shame. John couldn’t tolerate that. Had he looked at him with desire when he was unconscious in that room, on that bed? Harold, drawn to the sight of him like that without knowing why. He was electrified by the thought that some part of the man, even then, had felt something for him, had wanted dominion over him. Not pity, he thought, with relief. Harold had felt desire.

He squeezed his eyes shut, pitting his strength against the cuffs and chains and it made him almost delirious with pleasure knowing how securely Harold had bound him. He lay still after struggling, just barely moving his hips, waiting.


	23. Chapter 23

Harold’s garden was still yielding fresh lettuce and peas, even into the heat of July. The machine delighted in gardening with him. A feast for the senses and sensors. The colors were vivid. Layered shades of green, the sunny emergence of yellow cucumber and tomato blossoms, golden marigolds planted as crop protectors. The textures, the earthy smells, the fertility of the compost-rich soil, all of these things made time in the garden a palpable joy.

Shaw had begun to spend every weekend at her cottage. Sometimes Casey appeared. He had his own place tucked into the trails but Harold knew there was a lot of foot traffic between the two. A development that he noted without comment.

Root and her team were on the West Coast. Daizo and Caleb were focused on watching the development of Westworld, an adult theme park in the making, the fruit of Robert Ford’s strange passion. A playground for the wealthy where they’d enter a fantasy vision of the old west.

The phenomenon of Westworld dismayed Harold, the use of Ford’s talents and the use of visionary technology to indulge violent fantasies. The use of androids to encourage acts of rape and murder in the guise of entertainment. It offended his human sensibilities, even as he struggled to comprehend it in deeper terms without judgement.

Root and Jason were working with Control’s Agent Schiffman in LA. They were overseeing a training course for the LAPD. It could become the national model for incorporating the machine’s intelligence into local policing. The program was being called Outreach. Both Harold and Control were monitoring it closely.

Harold allowed part of his attention to center on Root as he puttered in his garden, listening to her opening address to the young officers the machine had identified as the best candidates for Outreach. These were tech-savvy police with strong community ties.

“Think of Outreach as preventative medicine,” she told them. “The wellness branch of an HMO, a way to stop problems before they happen. It’s a system that can alert you to people … who need help. Who need monitoring. It’s sensitive work and in some cases, it will need to be done undercover. The data comes from multiple sources that any one of you could search on your own, given time and resources. What Outreach does is collate and analyze data, pinpointing danger signs we often see in hindsight, but rarely in time to intervene.”

Well done, he thought, and her audience seemed engaged. He looked forward to gathering her impressions later.

 

***

 

John left Shaw, Casey and Bear at the beach when Harold summoned him. He now had the internal connection he’d craved that Shaw had with Harold. It developed with the change. 

“I’m finishing up in the garden,” Harold said. His voice, inside John, felt like a mental caress.

“On my way,” he answered. It was time for Harold’s meditation, a daily ritual they shared.

Unlike Shaw, John also had this connection with the machine itself. He’d accepted it reluctantly, but had discovered that the machine’s internalized voice was less disturbing than the any previous incarnation of its speech. Less jarring and artificial, more neutral.

It had been six weeks since he’d ingested the nano machines. Sometimes he thought he was imagining effects, anticipating them. He felt good. Not stronger but maybe more limber, somewhat energized. His eyesight seemed sharper, clearer. He hadn’t noticed his vision deteriorating with age but he did notice its improvement.

On the back deck, he washed the salt and sand off his body and toweled himself roughly in the sun.

He’d wished Harold was with them on the beach, he liked to swim with him. It was a private stretch of shore where only the most determined people who liked swimming and sunning naked ever appeared. John and Shaw had lately started stripping down to skin for their swims and were casually comfortable with each other’s nakedness. Casey adopted this ease though he would cover up quickly out of the water to protect his fair skin from the sun.

John suspected that Shaw and Casey were just as happy to be left behind on their own. He’d thought for a while that Shaw was tapping Casey. There had been an easing of tension. Shaw, for all her diatribes against sex between team members, seemed to have thrown in the towel on it. First Root, now Casey. She was taking what was offered, if she wanted it, he thought. He didn’t care where she turned, as long as it wasn’t in Harold’s direction.

John could hear Harold washing up in the bathroom, getting the dirt from the garden off his hands. He put his kneeling cushion on the floor beside the bed and set his watch on the nightstand, in view. The air felt cool on his bare skin after being in the sun but he was comfortable. Harold came out and John felt the warmth of being watched as he assumed the ritual pose on the cushion, sitting back on his heels, his legs a few inches apart, back straight, hands on his thighs. The position felt right.

Harold had asked him long ago to be naked when he brought him back from his meditations. Soon after, he’d dictated how he wanted John to wait for him during the time he was unconscious of his body.

“I want you to watch over me. Position yourself here, on your knees, close to me. You may shift the position of your feet as you need to, but please remain still and focused. Be calm but ready.”

“Ready for what, Harold?”

“For whatever threat could arise.” John realized then just how vulnerable Harold’s body was while his mind traveled elsewhere. He resolved to never leave him alone in that state again. There were times he wondered if Harold required this just to give him a task to perform. It didn’t matter. This was time he now looked forward to each day, twenty minutes he felt he shared with him, not twenty minutes in which Harold left him.

When Harold paused before lying down, to rest his hands on John’s shoulders and kiss the top of his head, he felt it as approval and like a promise to return and reward him at the end.

John would remain still and attentive, his hands resting on his bare thighs. Ready for any sign of distress, ready to welcome him back. His own breathing deepened and became even, his thoughts tending to quiet. The machine would witness his devotion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't really intend the story to become a crossover with Westworld but I'm dabbling in some of its elements.


	24. Chapter 24

Root made the decision after John underwent the change, to take the same step herself. It wasn’t an easy choice. She’d hesitated for a while, wishing the machine would guide her, or that Shaw’s decision would make things clear for her. But the voice of her god was resolutely neutral on this subject and Shaw wouldn’t say what she was going to do. In the ebb and flow of their relationship, they were definitely in an … ebb. Shaw was underscoring her independence. Not just from her, but apparently also from Casey.

The challenge, the enigma of Shaw, was a large part of what drew Root to her, it was as seductive as the woman’s sultry good looks. The people Root was drawn to were few; they were exceptional and difficult to get close to. Her pursuit of Harold was the starkest case in point. He was the most reclusive and private of men, and the most brilliant. She had literally hunted him down. Her aim had never been to hurt him. She’d wanted him to recognize her, care for her, let her adore him. Not romantically. She’d wanted him to see her as a kindred spirit, a worthy student. For him to be her mentor and share the mysteries of his creation.

There was so much she hadn’t understood then. How vital Harold’s humanity and compassion were, how vastly important the moral questions he asked were in shaping the machine. Growing close to him, close to his creation, had changed her. These relationships were precious. She wanted to stay with him and see where the journey led.

It was late October, the first weekend John and Harold were back in New York, back at the library. She’d flown in on a red eye from LAX. She’d spent most of her summer overseeing Outreach. Her first stop was her own apartment, not far from the library, where she unloaded her stuff and took a quick shower to revive from the flight. This time around she wouldn’t be staying on the fourth floor of the library, with Shaw. Maybe some time during her stay she’d be invited upstairs but she knew better than to assume anything. She stopped at the boys’ favorite bakery to pick up muffins.

“The tea smells good,” she said, walking into the library kitchen.

“It should, it’s from the box you gave me at Christmas. I save it for special occasions,” Harold said, and it made her smile. He looked good, she thought. Relaxed, still a little tanned from his summer on the Cape, but very much in his city mode. A trim vest, a beautiful shirt and tie, perfectly-tailored trousers.

“Cranberry orange muffins, Harry.” She opened the box.

“Perfect. Thank you.”

“So, you let your other half out to work a number with Shaw?”

“Yes.”

“You wanted to talk to me alone?”

“That’s true,” he said.

“Are you having second thoughts about the offer?” The machine had not told her what he wanted to discuss, only that he’d contrived to create an opportunity for a one-on-one meeting.

“No, no second thoughts about the offer, but I want to be certain that you … are sure.” He poured her tea. “To be frank, I didn’t think you would make this choice without Ms Shaw. It’s not … an easy course to choose.”

“I know that, but you’re stuck with me, Harry.” She was relieved to see this make him smile, even if the expression was a tiny bit sad at the edges.

“It’s my honor, my joy to continue to have you as a friend and companion … through whatever challenges lie ahead.” He paused. “What I fear, is that there is only so much John and I have to offer through what could be years of profound loneliness.”

“Blunt.” But true, she thought. She had thought this through; a thousand scenarios of outliving Shaw, of the necessity to lie to any potential partner. “The truth is,” she said, “even if Sameen makes the choice to do this, it wouldn’t exactly be a guarantee of … anything. You know her as well as I do. She’s not a til- death-do-us-part kind of girl.”

“Not in a traditional sense,” he admitted. “But she is a touchstone of intimacy for you, deeply connected to you in her own, unique way.”

Root sighed. He was right. Even when they were not engaging physically, not together, the woman was like a dark star at the center of things for Root. “I’m sure of my decision, Harold. You and John will just have to cuddle me a little from time to time.” She was relieved to see this teasing made him smile again, at least a little. He nodded and she thought he must be satisfied by her answers.

She saw him close his eyes for a moment, his expression becoming still and then the blue eyes were gazing at her gently, and he smiled warmly.

“She’s decided,” he said. “I think she may have been waiting for you. She didn’t want to influence your choice.”

Root took a breath, a soft laugh escaped her. She felt like she’d threaded a difficult maze and reached the reward.

 

***

 

“Yep,” Shaw said, giving John a sly side glance as they approached the library. “I’m gonna do it, but I’m not gonna do it the way you did.” She raised an eyebrow and looked pointedly at his mouth, in case there was any question what she was referring to.

He smiled. “Like I’d ever let that happen.”

“Like you could stop me if I wanted to.” The look of concern on his face made her laugh. It was just too easy to get to him.

 

***

 

“Are you happy that they’ll be with us?” John asked Harold that night, in bed.

“Happy for us, yes.” John wasn’t sure this was the answer he wanted to hear, but it was the one he expected. “You’re not?” Harold asked him, his voice gentle.

John sighed. There was no hiding his feelings from Harold. He’d come to know that the man could hear him, could understand his emotions from the slightest tells. This was … surrendering, in John’s mind. This was allowing himself to be known. It helped that Harold turned toward him in the dark and John took a deep breath when Harold’s hand rested on his chest.

“I liked … being the only one,” he admitted. “It made my place clear.” It was childish, it was a selfish impulse, but Harold allowed him to express such things in the safe embrace of his love. Kisses near his ear made John melt. Harold’s whisper made him shiver.

“You are the only one, John.” This was true. He knew it, but loved to have it affirmed. He alone occupied this place in Harold’s heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am planning to continue writing in the Merge universe but I'm going to let these chapters stand on their own. What may come will either be linked stories or maybe a part two. Thanks to everyone who traveled this journey with me!


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